


Providence

by meansgirl



Series: Missing Scenes [2]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Anal Sex, Anxiety, Blow Jobs, Fingering, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mentions of homophobia, Missing Scenes, Relationship Negotiation, honeymoon period, long distance, mentions of past relationships - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-03 12:44:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8714419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meansgirl/pseuds/meansgirl
Summary: What happened in Providence the first week of August, 2015?'Jack sees him immediately and grins. “Bits,” he says, and drops the bags, then the duffel, kicks the door shut and Eric is across the room already, filling Jack’s arms back up with himself, flinging his own arms around Jack’s neck and reaching up on his tip-toes to meet Jack’s mouth with his.'





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I would like to give a huge shout out to DoubleNegative, leftwinglibrarian, and kisahawklin for helping me out by performing beta duties and cheerreading this fic. I couldn't have done it without you guys, thank you so much. All remaining errors are of course, my own!

“This is fucking crazy,” Eric mutters to himself, looking back and forth between his own schedule alongside Jack’s.

“I know,” Jack says regretfully, from Eric’s laptop. “Sorry.”

“Oh, honey, no!” Eric looks up from his iPad in a hurry. “Don’t apologize, we knew it would be tricky trying to find time. It’s okay, it’s just for the season and the school year. Right?”

“Right,” Jack says on a sigh. He’s shirtless, which is distracting, fresh out of a post-workout shower.

This is the time they usually get to Skype - right after Jack’s morning workout, right before Eric leaves for work at camp. They usually fit a quick chat in before bedtime too, and they text as much as they can. Sometimes, if Jack is driving to the rink or to a press event and it happens to be Eric’s lunch break, he calls from the car.

Today, Eric is not only gearing up for his last day of work for the summer, but he received his official game schedule for next year just this morning. Their Skype date has turned into an impromptu strategy meeting.

“Okay,” Eric says. “So I’ll get to Providence on the first, and stay until that Thursday, and we’ll drive down to meet up with Shitty then you’ll drop me off at the Haus. That’s a nice long trip, baby, I can’t wait.”

“Same,” Jack says, warm and smiling. But that fades a little when he says, looking down at his phone, “Looks like we don’t have another free weekend until the end of August though.”

“Yeah and it’s only doable Friday night to Sunday morning, but that’s fine because we have two free weekends in September before your preseason.”

“It’s gonna get hard after that,” Jack murmurs.

Eric shrugs. “I know. But hey, let’s think of it like a bank account.”

Jack raises an eyebrow. “A bank account.”

Eric laughs, “Wow. I haven’t heard you sound that flat in months. I wondered if I could still throw you off.”

“A bank account, Bittle?”

“Uh huh, Mister Zimmermann, I will get to the point because I know you want to tell me to, but you’re being nice, very nice, and you look so good in that lack of shirt and--”

“Bits,” Jack laughs.

Eric leans forward. “Okay, okay. So yeah, like a bank account. You deposit in, and you take out, right?”

Jack nods his understanding and Eric warms even more to the metaphor.

“So for the beginning of August, and for a bunch of days in September we’ll just put all this time in. We’ll save it up in the bank account. That way, when your season starts and then mine, and we can’t put more time in, we can borrow from the time we already had. Get it?”

Jack stares through the screen, his chin resting on his hand. “You’re pretty great, Bittle, have I mentioned that recently?”

“Not since last night,” Eric says brightly, and is extremely proud of himself for not blushing. Last night had involved some pretty epic Skype sex, still a new thing for them (for Eric, period), and still a subject that gets Eric flustered most of the time.

“Oh right, last night,” Jack says, slow, a grin pulling at his lips. “That was great.”

“Shut up,” Eric says, clearing his throat. “So. Anyway. We’ll be fine, right?”

“Of course,” Jack agrees. Eric watches as he runs a hand through his damp hair and aches. Jack says, “So. Ready for your last day at work?”

“Lord yes,” Eric replies, leaning back in his desk chair. “Usually I’m a little sad to leave the kids. But this summer I’ve just been ready to be done almost since the second it started. I love it, I do, but…” He tilts his head and grins. “I just have more to look forward to, at the end of this summer.”

They talk for a few more minutes, go over the sparse number of days they’ll have come November, talk about Jack’s training schedule for the day and Eric’s plans for the last camp lunch of the year. When they move to say goodbye and sign off, Jack says “Four days.”

“Can’t wait,” Eric tells him, kisses his fingers and presses them to the camera before ending the call.

*

Four days, five Skypes, seventy-five texts, and one phone call later, Eric is on a plane and he is suddenly freaking out.

Oh, he’s not worried anymore that his relationship with Jack is figment of his imagination. He’s not even that stressed anymore that their schedules will ruin it. He’s not thinking, at least not right now, about what would happen if anyone found out about them, if the press got a hold of it somehow -- though that’s a nightmare he frequently has.

No. Eric boards the plane, stows his carry-on, asks the flight attendant for a Sprite, turns off his phone for take-off, and realizes he has just spent almost a month having Skype sex with Jack, and is about to actually see Jack in just a few hours. His face flames red as the safety demonstration gets started.

“Relax, hon,” the woman in the seat next to Eric says and he jumps. “I fly all the time. Safer than driving.”

“Uh huh,” Eric says weakly, and turns to look out the window at the tarmac, biting his lip hard to keep himself grounded as the plane starts to taxi.

*

The last text Eric received from Jack before he had to turn off his phone read: _Wish I could meet you at the airport._

Eric had texted back: _Uber is fine, stop worrying about it! You left me a key, right?_

Since Eric has been in the air Jack has sent:

_Yes. Just go to the security desk and show your ID._  
_I’ll probably be home not long after you get in._  
_I can’t wait to see you._  
_Make yourself at home._  
_I made you a drawer._  
_Hope that’s okay._  
_Bye._

Eric settles into the car he requested and smiles down at the screen. Jack’s texting has improved by leaps and bounds this summer, but sometimes he’s still so... _Jack_. Especially when he’s nervous. He taps out: In the car, be there soon. He adds a heart emoji and locks his phone screen in favor of watching Providence go by.

*

Eric has been in Jack’s apartment for twenty minutes when a key turns in the lock. He had stashed his duffel behind the sofa, left the two big suitcases he’s taking to the Haus by the door, and fidgeted in the center of the somewhat bland living room before finally just sitting on the edge of the striped sofa fiddling with his phone.

When he hears the door start to open, Eric springs to his feet. He almost sits himself back down, completely unsure of what he should be _going for_ here and how best to project it, but then the door is actually open and Jack is coming through it.

It takes Eric seconds to take a quick inventory of Jack- he showered at the rink, hair still wet and peeking out from under a Falconers snapback, gear bag over one shoulder, grocery bags in the other hand, and those stupid yellow shoes.

Jack sees him immediately and grins. “Bits,” he says, and drops the bags, then the duffel, kicks the door shut and Eric is across the room already, filling Jack’s arms back up with himself, flinging his own arms around Jack’s neck and reaching up on his tip-toes to meet Jack’s mouth with his.

 _Yes_ , Eric thinks when it starts off hard and hot. _Thank god_.

“Hi,” Jack manages to say between one kiss and the next.

“Oh, hey,” Eric responds, and decides screw it, he’s living out a fantasy right now so why not tackle another one while he’s at it. He takes a chance and wraps his arms tight around Jack’s neck and jumps, hoping Jack will figure it out and --

Jack catches him, big hands on Eric’s thighs. He turns them and presses Eric up against the door so he’s supported when he wraps his legs the rest of the way around Jack’s torso.

“Oh my god,” Eric says, one hand buried in Jack’s hair. “I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too,” Jack says, brushing his lips across Eric’s cheekbone. He gives Eric’s thighs a squeeze, rocks his hips forward.

Eric groans. The pressure, the way he can vaguely feel that Jack is hard, and the weight of Jack pressing him into the door are all amazing. He thinks, though, that they could do better. “Jack… Do you have a bedroom or what?”

Jack laughs against Eric’s cheek. “You know,” he says, backing away from the door and setting Eric gently on his feet before pressing him back against it again, “I didn’t plan on mauling you the second I saw you.”

“If anyone was mauling somebody, it was me. I did the mauling.” Eric tilts his hips forward, tightens his arms around Jack’s neck. “If you want to press pause, we can. You can give me the ten-cent tour of the apartment. We can make small talk about my flight. Or…”

“Or?”

“Lord, Jack, or you could just take me to your bedroom already because I’ve been dying to have you touch me again for a month.” Eric feels incredibly brave, and also completely unashamed. It’s exhilarating. He cocks an eyebrow. “So? What’s it gonna be, Mr. Zimmermann?”

Jack pecks him softly on the lips, puts some distance between them. Eric tries not to show his disappointment, and tries also not to _feel_ it because he’s here and they’re together and that’s enough for the moment--

“Whoa!” Eric finds himself suddenly slung over Jack’s shoulder. A laugh startles out of him once he gets his bearings. “Well this is quite the view,” he says, and impulsively smacks one hand against Jack’s left butt cheek.

“Chirp, chirp,” Jack says, giving Eric’s ass a slap of its own.

Eric laughs again as they start moving, swings his arms helplessly. “Nice carpet, though the hardwood in the living room is really more my thing,” he says, and hears Jack open a door.

“I’ll rip the carpet out,” Jack says seriously. Eric is plopped gracelessly onto a soft mattress. “Sorry, I tried to be smoother about that.”

Eric spreads his fingers out over the duvet, feels soft cotton and plush down under his hands, and pushes up to his elbows. “Well, you can try again later,” he says reasonably as Jack places one knee on the bed, hovering.

“Practice is good,” Jack says, nodding. Eric reaches up and knocks the snapback off Jack’s head, gets his fingers in Jack’s hair, and pulls him down for a kiss.

There are no fireworks overhead this time, just a ringing in Eric’s ears. A month of talking about this did nothing to prepare him for how it would feel to fall so naturally into something so physical.

This is Jack, and Eric is allowed to want him. Jack expects Eric to show it, he didn’t cool things off at the door, he wasn’t surprised by Eric’s enthusiasm. Instead, Jack met him with his arms open and didn’t hesitate.

Two months into his relationship with Jack and Eric feels as though the bigger world he had begun to inhabit at Samwell has been blown wide open. Eric is accepted, he’s worthy, he’s not defective, he’s not alone, and he’s invited to touch. Jack wants him, wants to touch him back. Jack thinks he’s cute, thinks he’s beautiful, thinks he’s hot. Jack kissed Eric’s stuffed bunny goodbye before he left Georgia in July. Jack sent him a hand carved recipe box “just because” two weeks ago. Jack is making him flashcards for the French class he’s taking this semester. Jack asked him to teach him how to make a cassoulet while he visits.

Jack is holding Eric’s face in his hands and kissing him. Eric can’t help but tremble under the sudden weight of his happiness.

They get undressed, eventually, clumsily, and things don’t go as hot, fast and heavy as they began. They kiss, trail mouths over bare skin. So much skin is on display, Eric is fascinated. He takes time to look up at Jack’s face and touch his cheek, then his neck. He presses his mouth to Jack’s collarbone and digs his fingers into Jack’s back as he grinds down into the vee of Eric’s thighs. Eric lets all these details burn slowly into his memory, and then he pushes and tugs until they change places, Jack rolling over and down, taking Eric with him. Eric takes some more time then to look down at Jack’s frankly unreal torso from this angle and skims his fingers over it.

“Your workout schedule must be insane,” Eric murmurs, flattening his hand over the hard muscles of Jack’s abdomen. He ignores the fact that his hand is an inch away from Jack’s dick, lets himself catch his breath for a second.

“Not really,” Jack says. His hips twitch up, trying to get Eric to move his hand down.

“You look amazing.”

“So do you.”

Eric rolls his eyes to the ceiling and tries not to blush. “Thanks.”

“I mean it,” Jack says, shoving up with his hips, flipping them back over again. The motion aligns his cock with Eric’s and he groans into Eric’s neck while Eric gasps and squirms.

“Jack,” Eric gasps, at a loss for what else to say or how to tell Jack that he would roll around in this bed with him, just like this, for the rest of the week. For the rest of ever.

Jack rests his elbows to either side of Eric’s head, keeps his weight off Eric’s torso and brushes his nose down Eric’s cheek. He rocks his hips, sliding them together just so.

“Thought about this, Bits,” he says. “Wanted to see you like this, wanted to touch you.”

“ _Jack_ ,” Eric gasps. He seems unable to come up with anything other than Jack’s name through the sharp bolts of pleasure.

“Bits, can I… can I blow you?” Jack slides back a little, pausing for permission. Eric nods frantically and thinks what a dumb question that is, they’ve talked about that and more at length in the last couple of weeks. Yes, he wants that.

“Okay,” Jack says and shifts down Eric’s body.

He looks up through his lashes before he takes Eric in his mouth, then they slide shut and he moans around Eric’s dick.

“ _Oh_ ,” Eric shouts, then slaps a hand over his mouth.

“The neighbors won’t hear,” Jack says, popping his mouth off and speaking into the crease of Eric’s thigh before he bites it. “Don’t be quiet unless you want to.”

Eric lets out a sob into his hand when Jack strokes a hand up his cock then follows it with his mouth again. He lets his hand drop to the pillow by his head, threads the fingers of the other through Jack’s hair.

It’s almost too much. Eric lifts his shoulders off the bed to look down at Jack, wanting to see him. Jack’s cheeks hollow as he slides his mouth up, and Eric feels the corresponding pull, the swirl of Jack’s tongue. God, it’s so amazing. And Jack… Jack has one hand wrapped around the base of Eric’s dick, sliding it up and down in rhythm with his mouth, using it to stroke Eric with a twist of his wrist when he pulls off every so often to catch his breath and brush his lips against the head. His other hand is out of sight, his arm moving in tight, quick movements.

“Fuck,” Eric says, strangled, “Jack, are you--”

Jack hums, his eyelashes fluttering as his opens his eyes to look up at Eric. It’s dark, the look he casts up Eric’s body to his face, his eyes sleepy-drunk. He pulls off again.

“Bits?”

“Jack, I’m so close.”

“Okay,” Jack says, nonchalant, and goes right back to what he had been doing.

Eric struggles to keep his hips still, but it’s hard. Jack just groans when he thrusts up more than he’d meant to. Jack likes that. Jack, actually, _loves_ doing this and is getting off on it. Eric pulls a little on Jack’s hair, fists his other hand in the duvet.

“Jack, I’m gonna--”

Jack makes a low mm-hmm sound that vibrates, and basically swallows Eric down to the hilt, and that’s it. Eric comes with a convulsive cry, his abs bunching as his body curls without his permission, everything going bright. Eric twitches hard, overstimulated, as Jack strokes and licks him through it. Jack takes his mouth away and gentles his hand. He pants hot breaths into Eric’s hip, and Eric struggles up onto his elbows in order  to watch Jack’s arm go still, his face contorting with a groan as he comes with his mouth open against Eric’s skin.

“Oh my god,” Eric breathes.

Jack presses his face to Eric’s thigh and lets out a sigh. “Yeah,” he agrees.

After a moment Jack crawls up the bed, frames Eric’s head with his arms, kisses him soft and slow and liquid, then falls to the side. Eric turns his head so their foreheads touch and hums as Jack arranges them into something resembling a cuddle.

There are a lot of firsts happening in that moment. Eric has never been naked in front of someone like this before. Has never been held like this. Has never done literally any of the stuff they just did.

He’s waiting to freak out. He’s waiting to feel awkward.

But it doesn’t come. Jack squeezes him hard and says, “Okay?”

“I’m…” Eric flounders for a couple seconds. “I’m so okay. That was hot. That was so. I mean. Next time, I get to touch you. Okay? Because that’s my job and, well, not that I’m complaining because it was _so hot_ , Jack. I’m gonna shut up now.”

Jack huffs against Eric’s cheek. “Next time you can have your way with me, Bits, I promise. I just, uh… Like doing that. I hope it’s okay that I -- you know.”

“Yes, it’s okay. Of course.” Eric shimmies even closer to Jack, pressing against his side and surprisingly not feeling at all weird about having his now-soft cock resting against another person’s thigh. He never really considered these tiny details when he imagined doing this, but now that they’ve become apparent to him he feels he should have some sense of awkwardness or shame or shyness, or whatever, but he just doesn’t. It just feels _right_.

“I was thinking I could take you out today,” Jack says. “We’ve never been on a date. Feels like we should.”

Eric smiles, charmed. “Really?”

“Well, yeah,” Jack says. “Maybe we can’t be, I don’t know, coupley in public but. I’d like to show you around, take you somewhere nice? Maybe?”

Eric reaches up, pushes Jack’s cowlick to the side. “Yes please,” he says softly. “I would love to go on a date with you.”

“Okay.” Jack beams. “But let’s not move yet. Can we just--”

Eric cuts him off with a kiss. Jack pulls him in tight, kissing back, smiling against Eric’s mouth as they pull away just enough to breathe. Eric has five days of this ahead of him. He sets himself to the task of remembering every weighted touch, every kiss, every single way Jack’s face changes from moment to moment, knowing he will need to save it all up, piece by piece, for later.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next: Jack
> 
> Visit me on tumblr! adventuresinsuburbia.tumblr.com


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains some difficult content related to mental health. See end notes if you would like to be warned!

Jack watches Bitty while he talks. They’re idling over dessert at a seafood place Jack had scouted out the week before. He had asked George for a recommendation then gone there himself to check it out, see what was nearby that he might want to show Bitty while he was in town. It was a good choice, and Jack will have to thank George at some point. Though, she had looked pretty knowing when he asked her if she had any suggestions. Jack is pretty sure George is going to be the first person on the Falconers staff he tells about Bitty, but now is definitely not the time, so he hadn't elaborated on who was visiting. Maybe he’ll email her his thanks. He’s starting to think he has a bad poker face.

Bitty is telling Jack all about about the ongoing jam recipe feud between factions of his mother’s family. The restaurant has low lighting, and they’re tucked in a small booth. The light is good for Bitty’s coloring, warms him up even more and catches the way his eyes sparkle through the telling of the story. They had gone walking around downtown before this, and the late summer sun had added a splash of bright pink across Bitty’s cheeks.

“Jack?”

Jack blinks. “Sorry, I promise I was listening, I was just looking at your sunburn.”

_That’s pretty embarrassing_ , he thinks. But he doesn’t look away, doesn’t duck his head or even give Bitty the self-deprecating shrug that is Jack’s go-to when he thinks he’s said something weird. He’s decided he’s going to go ahead and own how ridiculous he is with Bitty. It’s not like Bitty didn’t already know, anyway.

“Oh,” Bitty says, bringing his fingertips up to his cheeks. “Do I look like a lobster? Ugh.”

“No,” Jack chuckles. “You look cute, Bits. Come on.”

Bitty shakes his head and smiles. “Charmer,” he says. “Anyway, enough about the Phelps’ Jam War of 2015. I want to hear about your teammates.”

Jack does shrug now. “I mean, you know about them.”

“Yeees,” Bitty coaxes, “because I have repeatedly coerced you into talking about them, and you’ve given me a handful of names and their positions. What else? Who’s your friend on the team? Who’s weird? Who seems like kind of a dick?”

“I don’t know,” Jack hedges. “I mean, I only met them last month, right?”

Bitty’s eyebrows draw together and he gives Jack a look that Jack knows all too well. Bitty knows Jack is being _Jack_. Bitty knows it, and he also knows that Jack’s trying to fake it right now.

“You’ve barely talked to these guys, haven’t you?” Bitty sits back, one wrist resting on the table, where he taps thoughtfully on his water glass.

“I’ve talked to them,” Jack says too quickly, and knows immediately he’s coming off as defensive. The way Bitty narrows his eyes tells him that was a miscalculation.

“Oh?” Bitty takes a sip of water, eyebrows raised. “So, pick one of your teammates and tell me about them.”

“Ugh,” Jack shakes his head and looks away. “Fine.”

“Ja-ack,” Bittle sings, and Jack can hear the smile in his voice so he turns his head to look.

There it is. It makes Jack want to be more honest, which is disconcerting. Bitty could use his smile as a weapon against Jack, if he wanted. Jack wonders if Bitty knows that.

“I just… You know how it is,” Jack hedges.

Bitty nods, shrugs one shoulder. “I know how _you_ are.”

“Um.” Jack feels his face heat. “Yeah.”

“I don’t mean it like that,” Bitty says, kicking at Jack’s shin under the table. “Stop, stop, you’re getting sadface because you think I mean something else, but I _don’t_. Jack. Look at me.”

Jack looks up from the hands he has clenched in his lap. Bitty is still smiling, softer now, kind. It knocks the fight right out of Jack, so he uncurls his fingers. He can recognize that look. He forgets, sometimes, that he has people who know him now. That Bitty probably knows him best of all, aside from Shitty and Lardo.

Bitty nudges his foot against Jack’s leg again. “You think they won’t like you,” he says. “You’re wrong. And I think you’re worried that it’s all just temporary. You’re waiting for it all to come crashing down again. It _won’t_. Honey, you did it. You made it.”

Jack, who isn’t much for tears, has to clench his jaw hard against the sting in his eyes. “Oh,” he manages to grit out. “I--”

“Listen,” Bitty says softly. “We can talk more about this later if you want. This has been such a good day, the best, I don’t want to upset you. Just… don’t put your walls back up just yet, honey. You might not need them.”

Bitty lets that hang in the air for a moment, then puts up his hands and nods toward the empty dessert plate between them.

“Actually, I think we’ve thoroughly destroyed this creme brulee, so why don’t we head back to your place?”

Jack nods and clears his throat, letting the moment pass. He flags down their server.

“Thanks, Bits,” he says.

“No need to thank me, baby,” Bitty tells him. “It’s just the truth.” But he gives Jack another reassuring nudge with his toe.

*

Bitty falls asleep on Jack’s shoulder that night, about halfway through a movie they barely paid attention to. Jack rouses him enough to get him into the bedroom, helps him out of his clothes, and tucks him into bed. Jack slides in next to him and pulls him close. Bitty smiles sleepily. His lips are kiss-reddened and a little swollen, and he already has bed head.

“Cooking lesson tomorrow,” he mumbles into Jack’s neck.

Jack smiles. “Yeah. I have your flashcards ready for you too.”

Bitty groans. “Don’t make me study, Jack.”

“Hmm,” Jack runs a hand down Bitty’s back. “We’ll see.”

Bitty mumbles something vaguely grumpy, but he’s fading fast. He presses a kiss to Jack’s shoulder and his breathing evens out soon after.

Jack is exhausted. He’d had morning skate and a workout plus a quick meeting with George, all while anticipating Bitty’s arrival. He feels suddenly wrung out, now that there is no more reason for nerves. Now that they’ve had their first date and Jack didn’t screw it up somehow. Now that Bitty is here, in his bed, curled into his side, Jack feels as though he’s been thrown off of a rollercoaster and into a bubble of silence. His ears ring, and he recognizes that strange, mental tinnitus feeling immediately.

_No_ , he thinks, as his chest tightens. Jack feels the chill of cold sweat breaking on his forehead as he moves away from Bitty slowly, so slowly, because the last thing he wants is to wake him up. His brain screams at him not to wake him up, because it will all be fine if he can just get through this without Bitty seeing.

Jack forces himself to sit up on the edge of the bed and tries to take a deep breath. It's hard. He pushes desperately to his feet and stumbles a little on his way out the door, but he manages to stay quiet and Bitty doesn't stir behind him.

Jack’s hands are shaking by the time he makes it to the kitchen for a glass of water. He focuses on every movement, narrates them in his head. _Open the cabinet. Take down a glass. Breathe. Sink. Turn on the water. Breathe, you idiot._

He downs the glass and sets it down hard on the countertop. He grips the edge of the counter hard, until his fingers hurt, and bows his head to count his breaths, the muscles in his neck and shoulders tightening up. He can't pin down a single thought.

_Why? Why?_ Jack can't think of a trigger for this, can't place what set him off. He knows it doesn't always work like that. He knows not every panic attack is attached to something bad happening, and somewhere in the jumble of his thoughts he can hear his old therapist telling him that, can hear his mother reminding him of that while she rubbed his back and made comforting noises into his hair. Maybe he should call his mother. It's after midnight.

“Jack?”

_Fuck_. Jack bites hard on the inside of his cheek, because his first instinct is to snap, protect himself, get Bitty away from him. _Don't let him see_.

“Honey? Are you-”

“I. I'm fine,” Jack bites out. “Just. Go back to bed. I'll. I'll be there--”

Jack knows his voice sounds terrible. His brain screams at him to turn around. Smile. Make sure Bitty knows it's fine, who does this, _just act normal_.

A tentative hand rests on the small of Jack’s back. Jack doesn't move, can't, doesn't want to freak Bitty out or make him take his hand away. The hand presses more firmly and Bitty comes around to Jack’s side.

Jack closes his eyes. “Bits.”

“It's okay, baby,” Bitty tells him softly. “Just breathe. Come on. In.”

Jack does it. It's still hard, but Bitty moves his hand in soothing circles.

“Good, out.”

He can do this.

“Sorry,” he gasps on the next inhale.

“Don't apologize. Is this okay? Want me to go away?”

“Please don't,” Jack says, the panic edging into his voice even more. He squeezes his eyes against it.

“Ok. So let's just breathe together. Sound good?”

Jack nods. They stand there for a long time. Jack slowly starts to feel like he can breathe without timing each inhale to Bitty’s. His skin stops feeling so hot and cold. He starts to notice the ache in his fingers where they hold the counter, so he pulls them away and flexes them. He unlocks his knees and sags a little with relief. It's passing. He can actually hear himself think.

After a moment he says, “Thank you. I don't know what happened, I'm sorry.”

“Let's go back to bed,” Bitty says softly, taking one of Jack’s hands.

Jack follows him down the hall, feeling foggy still, but anchored to Bitty’s fingers wrapped around his own.

Bitty forces Jack into the bed first, making insistent noises, pushing with his hands, then finally saying, “Let me tuck you in, Jack Zimmermann. For pete’s sake.”

It helps push them back into reality a little more, and Jack snorts. “Yes, Bittle, okay.”

Bitty climbs in after him, but props himself up against the headboard instead of lying down. He touches Jack’s hair, and Jack sighs.

“Jack? Did I do or say anything at all to make you… I mean. Is this too much? Me being here?”

Jack pushes up and pulls Bitty’s hand out of his hair to hold it, squeezing just this side of too hard, he knows. “ _No_. Eric. No.”

“You never call me Eric.”

“Well, I am now, I'm talking to you and it's important. Listen, ok?”

Bitty smiles a little shakily. “Okay.”

“The anxiety will never be your fault. Ever. It's never going to be you, it's always me. This is just _me_ , Bits. I wish it wasn't but. It just is.” Jack lets go of Bitty’s hand and pulls him in by the back of his neck for a quick kiss. “This isn't too much. This attack didn't come on because this--you--did anything wrong. I think it's just… I can't really pinpoint a specific trigger. I think it's been a long day, and I've been so keyed up, and so… I've been happy, so happy you're here and it's like-- like a high, almost. I think I just… hit a wall.”

“Oh,” Bitty says quietly. “Well. Okay. Did I do the right thing, though?”

Jack gives the back of Bitty’s neck a little squeeze. “Yes. Thank you. You were perfect. Actually, my mom used to do the same thing, when it was really bad and this happened all the time. After the draft.”

“How are you feeling now?”

“Better,” Jack says, and pulls Bitty down to lie on the pillows. “Shaky, and my neck’s gonna hurt tomorrow from stiffening up like that. But this wasn't that bad, it's not like it used to be.”

Bitty finally relaxes a little and scoots closer. “I hate that it used to be so awful for you.”

Jack shrugs. “Ha, well, me too. Believe me. But like I said, it's not as bad these days. I think… I think the last two years have been like, a learning process. The anxiety has gotten more manageable since I stopped being… uh. You know what they called me. Hockey robot.”

“You're _not_ a robot.”

“No, but I tried really hard to be. And that didn't help. Samwell, Shitty, the guys… you. It changed everything. It changed how I lived-- I _got a life_. No place or person or team is ever going to cure the anxiety. But it helps, to have those things.”

Bitty opens his mouth to say something, but closes it and kisses Jack’s shoulder instead.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Bitty whispers. “I'm so proud of you.”

Jack lets his eyes drift closed. “Thanks. I'm so glad you're here.”

“Night, baby.”

“G’night, Bits.”

*

In the morning, Jack wakes up by himself in bed. A glance at the clock on the bedside table tells him it's 8:30, way past his usual wake up time. But he hadn't set an alarm, having cleared it with coaches to skip optional skate this morning (“It’s _optional_ , Zimmermann.”), and since he can't get out of his commitments tomorrow, he figured he and Bitty could relax today and pretend it’s his actual birthday.

Jack gets out of bed with a groan. He has a pulled tendon in his left leg that has been giving him grief, but now his neck and shoulders are stiff from last night’s episode. He doesn't bother with dressing, and wanders out into the apartment in his boxer briefs.

He hadn't heard the music from the bedroom, but in the hallway Jack can make out the faint sounds of Taylor Swift from the kitchen. He finds Bitty, predictably, cooking, and dancing a little to the music coming from a mini-speaker plugged into his phone. Jack leans against the island and watches, smiling.

When Bitty finally turns and catches sight of Jack out of the corner of his eye, he startles. “Oh! Jack! You're up! Pancakes?”

Jack shrugs one shoulder. “Anything you make, I'll eat.”

Bitty smiles broadly. He has a spatula in one hand, and he is wearing a pair of short blue shorts and a Samwell t-shirt. He turns back to the stove, but glances over his shoulder with a smirk. “Make yourself useful, honey, and set the table?”

And that is when Jack knows. It slaps him in the face and for a moment he is struck dumb as he thinks: _I love you so, so much_.

“Jack? You good?”

Jack snaps out of it and hopes he isn't blushing as much as he thinks he is. “Uh, yeah. Yes. I'll get the plates.”

Bitty gives him his _you're a dork but I think it's cute_ look. Jack moves numbly to the cabinet, but stops short. He waits a second for Bitty to flip the pancake he’s watching, then hooks one hand around Bitty’s hip and spins him around. Bitty yelps in surprise, and Jack catches the sound with his lips, turning Bitty so his ass hits the counter and not the hot stove, and internally pats himself on the back for pulling off a somewhat smooth move there.

Jack tastes the coffee on Bitty’s tongue, then pulls away to bite his lower lip just a little. The sound he gets for that, Jack files away for later. He drops a kiss on the bite and backs away, going for the plates.

“What was that for?” Bitty asks, a little breathlessly.

“The pancakes,” Jack says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This chapter contains the portrayal of a panic attack. 
> 
> Next: So what was the deal with Kent Parson?
> 
> Visit me on tumblr! adventuresinsuburbia.tumblr.com


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, major thanks to DoubleNegative, leftwinglibrarian, and kisahawklin.
> 
> And thank you so much to all of you commenting and leaving Kudos. You guys. I'm so beside myself. Thank you SO much for your feedback and support.

After breakfast, Jack had insisted on a run. Eric had reminded him it was supposed to be his early birthday fun day. To which Jack had replied “Like running isn't fun?”

So they're running.

“Have you not kept up with your cardio all summer, Bittle?” Jack chirps from several strides ahead.

Eric would be ashamed of himself, really, but he's pretty sure he can be forgiven this one sin. As a matter of fact, Eric has been running more this summer than he ever has in the off season. He wants to improve his endurance, see if he can pump up his speed even more.

He could leave Jack in the dust, and knows it. But if he lags behind, well, the view isn't bad.

“I'm pacing myself,” he tells Jack. Lies, lies, lies.

They're halfway through a trail loop in a park not far from Jack’s place. It's beautiful, plenty of shady stretches and places to stop and relax, though of course Jack doesn't seem inclined to pause and smell the roses.

There's a long uphill slog toward the end of the loop. If he'd gone full tilt the entire time, Eric never would have made it. As it is, he realizes pretty quickly that he can power right up this thing while Jack struggles a little. So, for the sake of future chirps, Eric goes full on without warning.

They reach the top only a couple strides apart, but Eric wins. His legs burn and he's pretty sure his lungs are disintegrating in his chest, but he wins.

To Eric’s surprise, Jack drops a kiss on his nose right there, in public. Eric very carefully doesn't look around to see if they're really alone. Instead, he smiles. “Ready to wrap this up so we can get going on your birthday cooking lesson?”

“Yeah,” Jack replies, breathless. He glances around, then smacks Eric’s ass as he takes off down the trail. “Race you!’

*

They practically fall into the apartment, sweaty and exhausted from running at a sprint back from the park.     
“I won,” Eric gasps, letting himself fold bonelessly to the floor. “I totally beat you.”

“You were faking,” Jack accuses. He stands over Eric, bent over with his hands on his knees to catch his breath. “You’re so much faster now.”

“Yep,” Eric agrees, then pushes up to kiss him, tasting salty sweat and Gatorade on Jack’s lips.

Jack drops to his knees and gets immediately into the kiss, running his tongue over Eric’s lips and giving him a soft groan when Eric opens for him. He pulls Eric up and into his lap, creating a height difference that places his head just under Eric’s chin. Eric loves it, loves looking down at Jack for once instead of up.

They’re sweaty and it should be gross. It’s not. Eric is sort of shocked at how not-gross he finds this. They both smell like the clean sweat of a workout, and once they’re out of their shirts, Jack’s skin is slick against his own. It’s not just not-gross. It’s a huge turn-on.

_Who knew_ , Eric thinks, grinding down into Jack’s lap with a sigh against his mouth.

“You’re hot when you’re winning, you know?” Jack muses, trailing his mouth idly down Eric’s throat.

Eric huffs and shakes his head, but presses gently against the back of Jack’s head so he knows Eric likes his lips there. “You _would_ find competition hot,” he says.

Jack squeezes Eric’s hips, guiding him a little to rock them just right. He moans into Eric’s collarbone. “Just with you, though.”

“Ha,” Eric says breathlessly, wondering if they could both get off like this, knows _he_ definitely could. “What else?”

“What do you mean?” Jack looks up at him, and absently runs one hand up Eric’s ribs to his chest, rubbing his thumb over Eric’s nipple, which makes him shudder and grind helplessly again.

“ _Oh_ ,” Eric bites his lip hard and tells himself not to come in his pants just yet. “Other than winning, which, uh, I’ll try to keep doing that--”

Jack is watching Eric’s face intently as he sweeps another pass with his thumb, this time scraping his fingernail just barely over the sensitive flesh.

“Yeah?” Jack prompts, dragging his other hand up to pay attention to the other nipple as well.   

Eric has to bury both hands in Jack’s hair to hold himself still. “That feels amazing.”

“I can tell,” Jack says, matter-of-fact. “You were saying?”

“You’re the worst,” Eric groans, his whole body twitching with every flick of Jack’s fingers. “I didn’t know I had sensitive nipples so, thanks for the revelation I guess.”

Jack laughs at him. “You’re chirping yourself now,” he says. “Finish what you were saying.”

“Tell me what you think is hot, Jack,” Eric says, and is amazed he has enough blood left in his upper half to actually blush. “I’ll do it. I want to.”

Jack swears in French, which is a rare occurrence, so Eric mentally pats himself on the back.

“You saying _that_ ,” Jack replies. “God.”

“And?”

Jack is already flushed but his cheeks burn even brighter, which helps. Eric doesn’t know how he can feel shy while dry humping someone on the floor, but he does. The fact that maybe Jack does too is a relief.

“I like giving blowjobs,” Jack says after a moment. “I just… it’s like being in control but at the same time it’s like I’m… I don’t know. It feels, um… kind of slutty? That I like it so much. And I like _that_.”

“Holy shit,” Eric breathes. “That’s amazing.”

While he spoke, Jack’s hands had moved away from Eric’s chest and back down, around to his ass. He squeezes. “I like this. You know, when you bend down to get something out of the oven? That’s like… porn.”

Eric is the one to laugh this time. “Oh yes, baking porn.”

“That’s you, right?” Jack chirps, squeezing again and then tilting Eric back to lower him gently onto his back on the floor. He stays upright, Eric’s legs splayed apart so he kneels between them, and runs a hand up Eric’s thigh and under the leg of his shorts.

Eric watches, fascinated and so turned on it’s nearly painful, as Jack gets his hand all the way up and closes his fingers around Eric’s cock. Eric lets his head fall back onto the floor and says, “Jack? Would you want to fuck me?”

Jack stills his hand on the upstroke. “Like now?”

Eric looks up at his face, which is open and hungry and gorgeous, and says, “No. Not like now. Right now I’m filthy and dying to come.” He rocks his hips up, sliding in Jack’s grip. “But sometime?”

“Yes,” Jack says, definitive and simple. He gives Eric’s cock a couple firm, gently twisting strokes. Eric whimpers. “Are you close?”

“God, yes.”

“Bits?” Jack leans down on one elbow, shifting a little so he can keep moving his hand and still get close enough to kiss Eric gently on the mouth.

“Yeah?” Eric moans, his hips moving in time with Jack’s hand of their own volition.

“You could fuck me too, if you wanted.”

“ _Oh my fucking god_ ,” Eric cries, and not for the first time while shouting that very same phrase, comes all over Jack’s hand.

“Well?” Jack says, bumping his nose against Eric’s while Eric comes down and catches his breath. “Would you want to?”

“You’re going to kill me,” Eric says, a note of hysteria in his voice. “Yes, Jack. Yes. But right now I’m gonna blow you, okay?”

“I guess that’s fine,” Jack replies, and Eric can not believe he signed up for this kind of ridiculous sex chirping.

He fake wrestles with Jack a little trying to get up and push him over. “You guess,” Eric says. “I’ll show you _I guess_.”

“That makes no sense, Bittle,” Jack tells him, finally letting Eric shove him down onto the floor.

Eric yanks Jack’s shorts down and doesn’t bother trying to chirp back. His brain is still moving slowly from orgasm, and he desperately wants to get his mouth around Jack, so he just does that and hopes actions speak louder than words.

Jack doesn’t speak, is reduced to wordless groans for a long time.

*

In the shower a little while later, Jack says, “I like that I can tell you things.”

Eric raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Oh?”

“Yeah,” Jack says. He starts to work shampoo into his hair.

“Here, let me.” Eric slides his fingers in alongside Jack’s and scratches through the bubbles and gently into Jack’s scalp.

Jack makes a pleased sound and takes his own hands away. “I’ve never really been with anyone I was this comfortable with. It’s… it’s great.”

“Well. You know I’ve never really been with anyone,” Eric says. “But… We’ve known each other a long time, Jack. You _know_ me. I think that makes it pretty easy to tell you things. Even things that are kind of embarrassing.”

Jack takes over to rinse his hair under the spray. He holds up the shampoo and nods to Eric’s hair. Eric nods and closes his eyes as Jack’s fingers pull shampoo through the strands, scratch at the nape of his neck.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Jack says, his voice pitched low. “You don’t have to be, with me, Bits.”

Eric blinks his eyes open to see Jack’s face, tilted down toward him, dripping water, hair plastered over his forehead.

_I love you_ , he thinks.

He says, “I’ll try not to be.” Then, “I think we should talk about some things.”

“Okay,” Jack says. He guides Eric around gently, aiming him toward the spray and tilting his head back. “What things?”

Eric pushes the suds out of his hair and says, “Past experiences? I feel like it might be good to get that stuff out in the open.”

Jack shrugs and reaches behind Eric to turn off the water. “Sure, we can do that.”

Jack gets out first and holds out a towel for Eric to step into. He wraps it around Eric’s shoulders, pulls him in with the towel to drop a kiss on his lips -- casual -- and Eric is absently charmed by how Jack is quietly fussing over drying Eric off, still naked and dripping water everywhere himself. Eric reaches for the other towel and presses it to Jack’s chest.

“Here. You’re sweet, but silly. Wrap up.”

Jack takes the towel but says, “Maybe I was looking for an excuse to rub you down.”

“You do that, we’re never getting around to cooking and I’m getting hungry, thank you very much,” Eric says.

“Fine,” Jack sighs. “Always thinking about baking, Bits, you have such a one-track mind.”

Eric snaps his towel at Jack, chirping, “You’re one to talk.”

Jack rounds on him in surprise, then shifts quickly into chase-mode. Eric can see it in the glint in his eyes.

“Oh no,” Eric says. “Don’t you DARE--”

Jack lunges, and Eric takes off out of the bathroom in a fit of giggles, Jack reaching for him and following close behind.

*

They’re chopping vegetables and rehashing their pasts when Eric gets up the courage to get to the point.

“So I guess what I specifically wanted to talk about,” he starts, “is Kent Parson.”

He watches Jack out of the corner of his eye. Jack pauses with the knife over half an onion, but only for a moment.

“Okay,” he says easily. “Yeah, I guess you figured out something went on there, eh?”

Eric shrugs, throws some parsley into a bowl. “I mean, did it?”

Jack chops the onion just like Eric showed him. Eric will tell him he’s doing a good job after they get through this weird, awkward conversation, but for now he waits.

“Well…” Jack shrugs. “We were best friends, and it… got physical. The year before the draft, when I was… really symptomatic, and we were both training and playing and anticipating what was about to happen -- well, what we thought was about to happen -- I think it all just kind of… got confused.”

“So?” Eric prods, hoping he’s not being pushy and weird. He’s just so curious, and a little jealous, he thinks. He wants to know. He wants to get Jack, and The Kent Parson Thing is something he should be more aware of.

“So yeah. We only hooked up a few times back in Juniors… and with the draft changing everything…” Jack shrugs again. “I don’t know. I don’t think he got over it.”

Eric wants to ask, _if it was just hooking up, what would he have to get over?_ But Jack is already moving on, mentioning the three girls he went on dates with at Samwell, and flipping the conversation back to Eric and “Rugby Guy.”

Jack asks Eric if he’s jealous. Eric, face in the oven, says he’s not.

He’s _not_ , really. Maybe he’s vaguely jealous, the way he is of Kate, Camilla, and Sam, too. But he means it when he tells Jack that Kent Parson acted like a grade-A asshole the one and only time Eric has ever met him. Eric knows he’s better than Kent Fucking Parson in terms of personality. But… it kind of sticks with him, that lack of detail from Jack.

He knows that the thing with Camilla was something of a non-starter. According to Jack, he hadn’t even known they were dating. They’d gone to Winter Screw, kissed in a sort of obligatory way (Jack described it thusly: “She’s a really good athlete! And yeah, very pretty, and very smart. I mean. I liked her, it was a fun time, so I figured maybe we would kiss? And then she just kind of did it and it was nice, I guess, so yeah. Camilla.”), and then a couple weeks later on chicken finger day in the dining hall Camilla told Jack maybe they should see other people.

It’s a story Eric heard last year from Lardo, who found the whole thing hilarious, and then again today from Jack, who seems pretty amused himself. Samantha and Kate, the other two girls Jack mentioned, were even less of a “thing” than Camilla Collins was. Jack describes them both as pretty blondes who went with him on “a couple dates” and one Winter Screw, respectively, and who he “kind of?” dated “a little bit.”

Eric has spent most of this conversation biting his tongue so he doesn’t blurt out what he’s thinking, which is: _Boy do you have a type. All blondes, Jack? Really? Also who doesn’t know they’re dating someone? You sweet summer child, how do you survive? Oh my god, so that means the only other person you have had actual sex with other than me is probably Parse. What the…_

So yeah. Sue him. He wants to know the deal.

After he’s pulled the cassoulet out of the oven, Eric asks, “How’d it end with Kent Parson?”

“Well…” Jack says, after a long pause. “He got drafted. I didn’t. And it… stopped. Looking back it really wasn’t anything more than physical. Hockey.”

Eric waits while Jack lets that sit for a moment. He thinks about interjecting but he honestly can’t come up with anything to say that doesn’t sound like a chirp, or like jealousy, or just stupid.

Jack continues, “And after taking my break, then Samwell, it takes a lot of growing up to realize someone wasn’t good for you.”

Another long pause, filled with all the questions Eric wants to ask: _Was he selfish? Did he make you do things you didn’t want to do? Or was it just that he partied so you did and then it got bad from there? I guess he’s the reason you know you love giving blowjobs, what was that like? Are you sure it was just hooking up? If he was your best friend, Jack, maybe it wasn’t?_

But Jack eventually speaks again. “And it kind of had an expiration date from the get go, you know? Push comes to shove… hockey came first. Something like that could’ve really messed with our careers.”

Eric feels his stomach drop to the floor, because he’s never actually heard Jack so much as tangentially acknowledge the truth-- which is that hockey does come first for him.

“Right,” he says, and he thinks he sounds normal. “You have to think about your career.”

They’re quiet for a while, each doing their part to tidy the kitchen. Eric struggles to push away the feeling of dread that sits in his chest now, because he knows he should ask Jack if they have an expiration date, too. That would be the right thing to do. Talk this out. Figure out what to expect. But he just doesn’t want to, it’s too hard.

Eric musters his brightest voice and moves on. “Oh! I just remembered. You said you had something else to tell me?”

“Oh yeah,” Jack says, and darts from the room.

Eric waits, shaking off the last of his nerves and telling himself to just let it go, not to taint the rest of his visit with misgivings and worries.

Jack sort of trip-falls back into the room and holds out a small, clear plastic box. He says, “Will you be my boyfriend?”

Eric looks down, sees a tiny, adorable, Lego version of Jack “#1” Zimmermann in his Falconers blue and just about _dies_.

A moment later he’s laughing at Jack’s nervous face and throwing himself into Jack’s arms and saying, “Of course I’ll be your boyfriend. So formal.”

The feeling of Jack lifting him up for half a twirl around the kitchen is enough, for the moment, to make Eric’s worries fade into the distance.

*

Later, what’s left of the cassoulet is packed away in the fridge and Eric is stretched out over Jack’s body, using him as something of a human pillow. Jack is propped up on a pillow against the arm of the sofa, and Eric has his arms crossed over Jack’s chest, flipping through French flashcards written in Jack’s small, precise handwriting.

This is probably the nicest day Eric has ever had. Jack is now officially his boyfriend. That’s… really something. Eric can’t even begin to describe how that feels, what it felt like to take the mini-Jack action figure in his hands, look up at Jack’s endearingly nervous face and realize what was being asked of him.

It’s everything. Everything Eric could never have in Georgia but desperately wanted. Everything he had hoped Samwell would mean for him. Everything he had fantasized about, when it came to Jack, for a long time.   
  
So he struggles, a little, with the tiny voice at the back of his brain that just won’t let go of Kent _freaking_ Parson. Something is just… off. Eric is under the impression that Jack might not be the most reliable of narrators on that whole thing, though he wouldn’t say that out loud to Jack. The reminder that hockey really does come first doesn’t help, either.

It’s not like Eric didn’t know that. It’s just that he hadn’t thought to connect it to the concept of a break-up until now.

He’s trying really hard to get over that and ignore the foreboding feeling it caused. He’s not doing the greatest job.

“Jack?”

Jack hums under him, his chest vibrating against Eric’s arms. “Yeah?”

“Do you think you’ll come out?” Eric keeps his eyes trained on the flashcard in his hands, but he’s not really seeing it.

Jack’s hand comes up and covers it. “Bits?”

Eric looks up. Jack looks worried. Eric knew he would. “I’m not saying I want you to. I mean, how could I expect that? My parents don’t even know about me so, what a hypocrite that would make me. It’s just that-- I’m curious, I guess? I, um. I wondered if you planned to keep--” _Me_ , Eric thinks, “keep your sexuality a secret for the rest of your career or…”

“No,” Jack says. “I don’t plan to be closeted for my entire career. Of course not.”

“Oh.”

“I mean… to be honest? I’m not really that worried about it. I’ll do it one day. Right now I have to focus on the season. It’s my first year, it’s a young team, there’s a lot. It’s _a lot_. I know better than to add to it.”

Eric lets his chin rest on his hands, over Jack’s sternum. “So, no timeline in mind?”

“Not really. I don’t want to hide forever, though.” Jack shrugs. “What about you? Your parents?”

Eric sighs. It’s only fair that Jack would ask him that, considering Eric kicked that hornet’s nest. “I thought about telling them this summer, but I chickened out. It feels… like not such a great idea, while I’m still in school.”

Jack’s brow furrows. “Do you think they wouldn’t support you if you told them?”

Eric shrugs. “I mean, not really. But if it didn’t go over well, I wouldn’t want this summer to have been the last one I spent in Georgia, you know? I’m not ready for that, if it happens.”

“Bits,” Jack murmurs. He rubs Eric’s back with one big hand, touches his cheek with the other. “I met your mom and dad. Obviously you know them better than anyone else, but… I just can’t picture it going that badly.”

“I know,” Eric says. “I guess I can’t either? But whenever I’m home, I just feel so different from everyone else, and like I have to be this other person to keep people from realizing it. Even if my parents were fine with me being gay, almost no one else would be. That wouldn’t just affect me, either. That would be hard on them, and I can’t stand that. Maybe after I graduate, it would be easier. I’ll be… somewhere else, I’ll have a job, I won’t be home all summer or even that often anymore and… people won’t notice that the Bittles have a queer son.”

Jack is silent. His hand has gone still on Eric’s back. Eric had averted his eyes while he talked through all that. Now he glances up and sees that Jack’s head is tilted back, his jaw clenched and his eyes hidden from Eric’s view for the moment.

“Jack?”

“Fucking--” Jack cuts himself off and clears his throat. He looks back down at Eric and makes a gesture that seems to say he’s at a loss. “That’s terrible, Eric.”

“I know,” Eric says. “It is what it is, though.”

Jack shakes his head. He shifts under Eric, grabbing the flash cards from off his chest and tossing them to the floor before maneuvering Eric sideways, smushing him between the couch cushions and Jack’s body.

“It shouldn’t be that way,” Jack says to the top of Eric’s head. “Someday it won’t be. It won’t.”

Eric huffs a laugh into Jack’s chest, and winds his arms around Jack’s waist to squeeze. “Oh baby, I hope so.”

“I wish I could make it better for you,” Jack mumbles.

“You do,” Eric tells him, his eyes drifting closed. “I promise, you really do.”

Jack kisses the top of Eric’s head, and Eric presses his ear against Jack’s heartbeat and breathes, the nagging feeling from before momentarily forgotten.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Jack and the Falconers


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't stop thanking my wonderful, amazing betas! 
> 
> And you guys are leaving me so many nice notes and I am just SO glad you're enjoying this fic and I appreciate you all so much. Thank you!

  
  


On the morning of his birthday, Jack has an early meeting with his coaches, followed by a few hours of PR, some ice time, and a late afternoon workout. He had set his alarm for 6, so when he is woken by a hand in his hair and Bitty’s voice saying his name soft and low, Jack startles.

“Did I oversleep?” He panics a little, moving to sit up.

“Shh,” Bitty soothes. “No, baby. You have half an hour before the alarm goes off.”

“Oh,” Jack says, still groggy and getting even more so as the momentary panic wears off. “Okay.”

“Happy Birthday,” Bitty whispers. 

Jack smiles, thinking they're going back to sleep now. “Thanks.”

It's quiet for a moment, and Jack could easily drift off until the alarm sounds. The bed is warm in the cranked-up air conditioning of the condo. He has one leg out in the chill, and Bitty close up against his other side like a furnace. Jack's never been this comfortable, he's convinced of that.

“Jack?”

“Mm?”

“I have a birthday gift for you.”

Jack rolls onto his side to face Bitty and tries to kiss him in the dark. He succeeds in bumping his nose into Bitty’s forehead so he settles for smelling his hair, which is nice. He's definitely not awake yet.

“My cooking lesson was my birthday present,” Jack reminds Bitty. “That's what I wanted.”

Bitty snorts. “Right. And don't think I'm not fully aware that you were being kind to my tiny budget by requesting something you technically paid for.”

“Nah,” Jack protests. “I just like you. Like cooking with you because you like it and it's nice to watch you do stuff you like. I… like that.”

“Jesus, Jack, are you even awake right now?”

“No.”

Bitty kisses his jaw and says, “Well, wake up. We now have 27 minutes before the alarm goes off and I want to give you your present and then I want to blow you.”

“I'm getting a blowjob?” Jack asks, rolling onto his back and making a valiant effort to drag Bitty with him. He gets as far as pulling Bitty over to sprawl against his chest. “S’wawesome.”

“That's not the gift,” Bitty huffs. He smacks Jack lightly on the chest and climbs to the end of the bed. “Here. Sit up, sleepy. And turn on the light.”

Jack laments, privately, his intense attraction to bossy, short, blond people. This is what it gets him. But once he props himself up and reaches over to flick on the lamp, he changes his mind. He has a type, sure, but it's a good type. Bitty is shuffling forward on his knees with a gift bag in hand. He's rumpled, with his hair sticking up at the back and the faint traces of pillow creases on one cheek. He's gorgeous.

Jack  _ loves  _ him, and he smiles when Bitty hands over the bag so he won’t open his mouth and blurt that out. Now isn’t the moment for that. Jack will find the moment for that. But this isn’t it, he doesn’t think. 

“You didn't have to,” he says, taking the gift.

“Don't get excited, it's not fancy,” Bitty tells him. He rubs his hand over the short hairs at the back of his head, nervous, and settles down, crossing his legs and leaning forward. “Open it, though.”

It's a frame. Jack slides it from the bag and gently pushes aside the tissue paper. Inside the frame is a piece of white printer paper, an APA cover sheet it takes him a moment to recognize. He reaches out and touches the red, circled “A” at the top.

“Our project,” Bitty supplies.

“I know,” Jack says, smiling. 

“Sorry,” Bitty says. He's twisting his hands in his lap. “It's lame.”

Jack looks up. “What? No, it's not.”

“It is. I just… I wanted to give you something priceless and I couldn't think of anything really, but. I guess this, working on that project together and you letting me show you how to do my favorite thing, and how much fun it was. That. Well. That was priceless. To me. So. Thank you.”

Jack is a little bit floored. “ _ Bits. _ ”

“Sorry,” Bitty covers his face with his hands, shaking his head. “Ugh.”

Jack reaches up and pushes Bitty's hands down. “It's perfect, Bits. It was priceless to me, too. This is great.”

“I should've like, bought you something.”

“I can buy anything I want. I can buy all of it  _ twice.  _ This is  _ perfect, _ ” Jack says, and means it. It's the most thoughtful gift anyone's ever given him. 

“You're sure?”

“Yes.” 

Jack leans forward over the frame and tugs Bitty to meet him halfway. They kiss, soft and mostly chaste. Jack’s heart is hammering in contrast to the gentleness in it. His thoughts are still a bit of a jumble, this soon after waking, and he keeps thinking,  _ I don’t deserve any of this, but please don’t ever leave.  _

“Now we have 22 minutes,” Bitty mumbles when they pull apart, and Jack is relieved that Bitty’s hands on his shoulders help him wake up, help his head to quiet down. “I can definitely work with that.”

He pushes Jack back against the pillows and sets the frame aside so he can climb into Jack’s lap. He kisses Jack again, puts a little force behind it, and reaches down to wrap his fingers around Jack’s wrists. Jack can't help but moan into it. 

Bitty is almost half Jack’s weight and half a foot shorter. Jack could take control of this if he wanted, could move Bitty wherever Jack wants him. Could shake Bitty’s hand off his wrists like it’s nothing.

But he won't. Because he'd rather be exactly where Bitty wants him to be, loves the feel of Bitty’s fingers closed just a little tightly, warm and perfect against Jack’s skin, and the way Bitty is getting comfortable enough to not just initiate this but control it without asking.

Jack kisses Bitty back, and thinks this is his favorite birthday so far.

*

The morning meeting is quick, consisting mostly of reminders to stop in and consult with the trainers and dieticians next week since it marks the start of the heaviest period of training before the season starts. The PR stuff is a little less easy. 

“So, I know it's not your favorite, but we're getting some requests for interviews,” Kendra, one of the PR managers tells Jack apologetically. “You're gonna have to do at least one. Everyone else can get the sound bites after the fact. CBC reached out. So have local news outlets and ESPN.”

Jack sighs. Kendra’s right, he hates interviews. He always comes off wooden and monosyllabic, and the questions always circle back to Jack’s father, which is  _ fine _ , except Jack can't help but think mentioning Bad Bob in interviews just drives home the fact that Bad Bob’s  _ son  _ is like a less interesting, more fucked up version of the original.

Jack thinks to himself, wryly, that somewhere out there his therapist just got a chill and doesn't know why.

To Kendra, Jack says. “Okay. Are we talking long form sit down or…?”

“No,” Kendra shakes her head. “Short. You could be videoed in if you decide to go with CBC. We can get the questions beforehand, talk it over, whatever you like.”

“I really don't want the focus to be the overdose,” Jack says bluntly. “I know it's going to come up, but it’s been seven years at this point and I just don't want it to be the whole…” Jack waves his hand.

“We can try and guide them away from that narrative, focus on your successes in your college athletic career.”

“ _ Yes, _ ” Jack agrees quickly. He can see the surprise on Kendra’s face. He has probably never sounded this okay with anything media-related in any of the handful of meetings they've had. “I'm happy to talk about Samwell; I credit my time there with my even being here at all.”

“That’s wonderful, Jack.” Kendra smiles. Jack likes her, she's the kind of person who listens more than they talk, which isn't something Jack has come across in years of dealing with public relations people. She had been one of the first Falconers staff members to meet him once he arrived in Providence this summer, and she had been straightforward and easy to talk to from the start.

“So I guess it doesn't matter to me who I talk to. Not ESPN.”

“Yes, your father is still occasionally sending them angry tweets,” Kendra muses, tapping on her iPad. “CBC is more hometown for you, but then a local affiliate is more hometown for  _ us _ , so either one is fine, really.”

“Here is good,” Jack says. “I've honestly barely lived in Canada since I was a child, and this is home now, so.”

Kendra smiles and nods. She starts sending emails before they even finish talking. Before Jack goes she promises to forward him the details of where and when. “Maybe this weekend? Sunday, Monday at the latest. I could have questions outlined by Friday.”

“Sure,” Jack agrees. “I'm out of town Thursday through Saturday morning but I'll be able to check email.”

“Ah.” Kendra sets her iPad down. “One last mini vacay before the grind really starts?”

“Ha. Not really.” Jack tells himself not to do “the face,” as Bitty calls it. The one Bitty says Jack makes when he's trying to be casual and not doing that great at it. “Just Boston. Visiting Samwell before the semester starts on Monday.” 

“Missing college life already?”

“Something like that,” Jack hedges. He gets through the last of the details and talk-to-you-this-weeks with Kendra before making his way toward the locker rooms.

*

He’s just lacing his skates when he hears a booming voice coming from outside the door. Jack stiffens, pausing with the laces twisted around his fingers. He has the ridiculous urge to run and hide, but he can hear Bitty telling him to “buck up, and say hi,” so he just waits for the door to swing open and admit the source of the voice: Alexei Mashkov.

_ Don’t put your walls back up just yet, _ Jack remembers Bitty saying. Mashkov could step  _ over  _ an  _ actual _ wall if Jack had one. The guy is huge. And loud. And smiley.

“Jack Zimmermann!” Mashkov booms, entering the locker room. “No skate today, what you are doing here?”

Behind Mashkov, a much quieter voice says, “Yo, Zimmermann’s here?”

Snowy pops his head around the doorway.

“Uh… hey!” Jack says, going for friendly and probably missing by a mile. 

Mashkov--Tater, Jack reminds himself--doesn’t notice. “He has skates on, Snowy, and no skate today!”

“You skating alone, Zimmermann?” Snowy prods, stepping fully into the room. “We were gonna go grab lunch, you could come do that instead?”

“Yes!” Tater agrees, clapping his gigantic hands together. “You coming to lunch with us.”

Jack is still just sitting there with his laces pulled tight. He probably looks like an awkward mannequin. He lets go of his skates and sits up. “Well.”

“C’mon, Zimmermann,” Snowy cajoles. “Shit, Guy’s coming with us too. He’s the oldest fucker on the team and he’s been dying to get you to speak three words to him since you got here."

Jack doubts that. He’s never seen Guy without a scowl on his face, usually directed at Jack, it seems. He doesn’t think Guy likes him. Probably thinks Jack is a lazy drug addict, or past his prime, or maybe he just thinks Jack is a basket case.

But maybe Jack is wrong, as he so often is. He should say yes. Bitty would shove him out the door, rolling his eyes, telling him to get over himself and  _ go. _

“Uh.” Jack looks from Tater’s wide, guileless smile to Snowy’s raised eyebrows. He looks down at his skates. He can still hit the gym after lunch. “Yeah, alright.”

“Yes, Jack Zimmerman! Today we rename you!” Tater comes over and claps Jack on the shoulder which rocks him forward. He goes with the motion and works on getting his skates off.

*

Jack does not make it to the gym. In fact, he ends up letting Guy drop him off at his condo. 

Lunch is great, Jack can say that with some certainty. His name is now Zimmboni because, Tater says, “Zamboni on ice all alone after we all leave, like you Zimmboni. Ah, perfect.”

Guy gruffly and quietly yells at Jack for overdoing it, which is weird.

Then the guys somehow find out it’s Jack’s birthday. They're talking about the fact that Guy’s daughter is almost thirteen and then they're talking about how Poots is practically Guy’s daughter’s age, and then somehow Jack lets slip that he turns twenty-five today. 

The guys lose it. Texts are sent. Poots and Thirdy show up. Mashkov orders drinks.

Jack says, “Oh, I don't drink much.”

“Have one on us, kid,” Guy grumbles.

Jack glances nervously at the time on his phone, wonders what Bitty’s up to at home, and says. “Okay. One.”

Tater, thirty minutes later, says, “Okay Zimmboni, you doing vodka now.”

“Oh no,” Jack protests, still laughing at something Thirdy is saying. “Tater, I can't. I still have to--”

“Zimmboni!” Poots cheers, which prompts the others to cheer too. 

They threaten to tell the waitress and get the restaurant staff to sing to him. Jack takes the vodka.

An hour later, he has had two more vodkas, actually, and he really needs to go home. Guy laughs at him. 

“I'll drive ya home, kid,” he says, whacking Jack on the back.

“I'll pick you up tomorrow for morning skate. Get your car then,” Snowy tells him.

Jack isn't  _ wasted. _ But he's drunk. He's sure he's a little drunk. “Alright,” he agrees. It seems like a perfect solution. He likes these guys. They're good guys.

*

Guy cracks a dad joke as they pull up to Jack’s building. 

“Alright, Zimmermann, I'm not stopping so tuck and roll.”

Jack snorts. “You sound like my dad.”

“Yeah?” Guy pulls to a stop at the curb. “Hey, tell him I say hi.”

Jack would normally be a little spooked at a reminder that some of these guys know his dad personally, but he's still smiling from the good time and warm from the drinks so he reaches over and shakes Guy’s hand before getting out of the car.

“I'll do that. Thanks for the ride, man.”

“Anytime,” Guy says, for once not scowling quite so intensely. “It was good to see you loosen up a little, kid.”

Jack smiles. “Thanks.”

*

Jack lets himself into the apartment, calling as he opens the door, “Bits! Hey, Bitty? Are you here?”

Bitty's head pokes out of the bedroom down the hall. “Hey! You're loud!”

“Oh, sorry,” Jack stage whispers, toeing out of his shoes.

“Jack?” Bitty steps fully into the hallway at that, eyebrows raised. He's obviously just showered, hair still damp, and he's wearing one of Jack’s button-downs over a white v-neck and a pair of joggers.

“You're adorable,” Jack states, kicking his shoes to the side and getting a little tripped up in the process.

“Oh, my god,” Bitty says, clearly beginning to understand the situation as he walks toward him. “You're drunk.”

“Only a little,” Jack says dismissively. He dumps his keys and wallet on the table by the door. 

“You… wait.” Bitty snags his phone off the kitchen island on his way over to Jack. He holds it up, grinning. “Can we Skype Shitty if he’s not busy?”

“Oh yeah, that sounds great,” Jack says. He reels Bitty in as he’s texting and kisses him soundly. “You taste good.”

“I made maple banana muffins,” Bitty says absently, typing away but tilting his face up to accept the kiss. “Did you drink a cosmo? Is that cranberry?”

“Um.” Jack thinks, and remembers specifying that after the first vodka, any more drinks had to be  _ mixed _ , no shots. “Yes.”

“I have so many questions,” Bitty breathes, shaking his head.

“Are you mad?” Jack asks, though the worry feels kind of distant at the moment, and clutches at Bitty's waist. “I'm sorry.”

“What?” Bitty squeezes him back, then reaches up to touch Jack’s face. Jack leans into it with a sigh. “No? I'm not mad, honey, just confused. I thought you were gonna get some ice time in and hit the gym?”

“Oh, Tater came and asked me to come to lunch instead. And then everyone showed up. And then birthday drinks. Man, I really can't hold my vodka anymore.” Jack knows he’s babbling, but can’t seem to stop himself. He remembers why he rarely ever had more than one beer at any of the Haus parties. 

Bitty snorts and covers his mouth on a laugh. “Oh, wow. So you got drinks with the guys. That's… fantastic. Yeah, we need to Skype Shitty, he’s gonna love this. I need to confirm our Thursday plans anyway.” He looks down at his phone. “Great, he’ll call in ten.”

“Shitty is the best,” Jack sighs. “So are you, Bits.”

“Let's sit down, honey.”

Jack is happy to be led over to the sofa, where he pulls Bitty down after him, then arranges him to his liking. Bitty lets out an  _ oomph  _ as Jack hauls him up to sprawl across Jack’s chest.

“You know,” Bitty says, leaning up on his elbows, “we can't be all snuggled up when he calls.”

“That's okay,” Jack says. “Just for now.”

He leans up and kisses Bitty’s nose because it's cute, then leans back against the throw pillows to look at him.

“I'm so glad you're here.”

“Me too,” Bitty says with a smile. “You're so drunk, I don't know what to do. Those boys must not know that their newest star is such a lightweight. How did you get home?”

“I think they know,” Jack says, shaking his head. “They're sneaky. But it was… nice. Guy drove me home.”

“Yeah? I'm so glad. Tell me about it.”

Jack is happy to. He's weirdly proud of himself, or at least he thinks it will make Bitty happy, that he made the effort and it worked out so well. He knows he's going to feel guilty later for skipping the gym, but that's later. For now he recounts the lunch for Bitty, delighting in every laugh he gets. The Skype chime sounds from Bitty’s phone just when Jack is finishing re-telling the story Thirdy had told him about a squirrel infestation at the rink his first year.

“That will be Shitty,” Bitty says, reaching for his phone.

“Wait,” Jack says, tilting Bitty's face back toward him before he can answer the call. He kisses Bitty slowly, presses in, lets his tongue tease against Bitty’s lower lip, pulls away with a nip, and one soft peck. “Okay, answer it.”

“You're the worst,” Bitty says, running his hand over his flushed face as he sits up and slides sideways so he occupies his own sofa cushion. “Good lord.”

“Just answer the phone, Bittle, and I'll finish that later.”

Bitty shoots him a look, and hits the answer button.

“JACK MOTHERFUCKIN’ ZIMMERMANN! Is it true? Are you  _ intoxicated  _ right now? At two-oh-seven p.m.? On this third of August, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BY THE WAY YOU MAGNIFICENT BASTARD, in the year of our lord twenty fifteen? Or is Bitty a lying liar who lies? Oh, hey Bitty, by the way.”

Jack leans against Bitty’s shoulder a little to watch Shitty (who is shirtless, possibly fully naked though it's impossible to tell-- thank god) on the screen. 

“Shiiiiiits,” Jack says, “I miss you!”

“Oh, wow, Bitty you weren't kidding.” Shitty leans forward, elbows on his desk. “What the hell happened? Were you kidnapped? Did they  _ force _ you?”

“Nah, they're just nice guys. Like you.”

“So you're making friends,” Shitty says, a little wistfully. “That's good.”

“Aw,” Bitty cuts in. “Don't get jealous now, Shitty.”

“ _ Moi _ ? Never! I mean, I'm  _ definitely  _ not jealous that you get to hang out in Jack’s sweet new spot while I'm stuck here with all these  _ yuppies _ . Not jealous at all that Jack Laurent Zimmermann invited you, and not me,  _ never _ me, Bits, he doesn't call, he doesn't write--”

“I call you,” Jack protests, but Shitty is on a roll as usual.

Shitty says, “I demand bro time. And now here you are, drunk in the middle of the day. What’s next, puck bunnies? And don’t think you can just ply him with pies and steal my best bro, Bittle.”

“Yeah, it’s the pies,” Jack deadpans. “That’s it.”

Bitty pinches him on the thigh where Shitty can’t see. Jack shifts and gets his hand on Bitty’s knee, gives it a little squeeze. 

“We’re coming to see you Thursday,” Bitty says. “Isn’t that ‘bro time’?”

“I guess,” Shitty concedes with narrowed eyes. “Wish I could come down to the Haus with you guys, make sure it’s in tip top condition for the tadpoles.”

“I promise I have it under control,” Bitty tells him. Jack runs his hand up Bitty’s thigh and gets his hand smacked away. Bitty’s smile stays in place as he continues talking to Shitty. “Rans and Holster will be there too, and they need to stretch their captain wings and everything.”

Shitty pouts. “But Jack gets to go.”

“I promise not to enjoy it too much,” Jack says. He smiles at Shitty and obediently doesn’t put his hand back on Bitty. He feels warm, and happy, and a little woozy, a little sad somewhere in there because he really does miss Shitty and he’s been worried about going to the Haus without being able to stay for the first time in years. But it’s just so  _ nice _ , sitting here with them. “So? Harvard? How is it?”

“ _ Ugh, _ ” Shitty starts, and then he’s off.

*

Later, once they’ve firmed up plans with Shitty and Jack has been chirped to hell and back for his “wild hockey star behavior,” Bitty hangs up and tosses his phone on the coffee table. 

“Well,” he says, throwing up one hand. “Shitty’s stressed.”

“Yeah,” Jack sighs. He pushes into Bitty’s side, aiming for a cuddle, then changes his mind and drops down with his head in Bitty’s lap instead. There are immediately fingers in his hair and Jack, satisfied, closes his eyes. “Worried about him.”

“He’ll do fine. You should invite him up for the weekend some time, though.”

“Yeah,” Jack murmurs. “Maybe one of the weekends you guys have a game and I don’t.”

“Sure,” Bitty agrees easily. “Jack?”

“Mm?”

“No puck bunnies.”

Jack opens his eyes to Bitty’s mock-glare and laughs, burying his face in Bitty’s knees. “You got it, bud. No puck bunnies.”

Bitty scratches his nails over Jack’s scalp and Jack turns his head to look up at him. 

“Tomorrow I want to go shopping.”

Bitty blinks down at him in surprise. “ _ What? _ ”

“Like, for house stuff. I should probably decorate or whatever. I told Kendra this is home now, so.”

“That's the PR woman you said was nice, right?”

“Yeah.” Jack scrunches his nose, knows he probably looks weird. “I have to be on TV.”

“Well yeah, pro hockey games are usually televised,” Bitty says, voice dripping with what Jack privately describes as  _ chirpiness _ . He softens it with a hand on Jack’s arm, running soothing strokes with his fingertips.

“No, like an interview,” Jack clarifies. “Soon.”

“Ah,” Bitty leans down and presses his lips to Jack’s forehead as if in apology. “Well, that’s to be expected. It’ll be just fine, you’ll see.”

“Mmhm.” Jack shrugs. “Maybe.”

They sit in the quiet for a moment, Bitty keeping up a gentle touch over the parts of Jack he can reach from where he’s sitting, and Jack letting him while his brain sort of empties out.

“But anyway,” Bitty says after a while, his voice going bright. “Yes! We can go shopping! I’m kinda glad you said something because honey? This place has  _ no _ personality.”

“You’ll give it some,” Jack tells him with certainty. “Tomorrow, after morning skate and the gym?”

“Whatever you want, Jack,” Bitty says quietly, stroking Jack’s hair again.

Jack feels himself start to drift off, the long morning and Tater’s vodka starting to pull him under. He tries to say something to Bitty, but he's tired and it comes out as an incoherent mumble. He falls asleep to the soft sound of Bitty laughing at him, and the feel of gentle fingers passing over his forehead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Shopping/feels trip


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Endless thank you's to the three amazing people who are beta reading for me chapter by chapter. And to everyone, again, who is still reading :) I love reading your comments and finding kudos in my inbox, so thanks for making my day!

 

Eric isn't a patient person. He's just not. It's one reason he bakes, and so prolifically. He needs to be doing something. He’ll have one pie in the oven and start rolling out the next crust. School work is necessary, obviously, but tedious. He doesn't have the patience to ever enjoy it, and most of the time he does it with one eye on a kitchen timer.

On his fourth day in Providence, he makes three pies. Jack had stocked the kitchen with a ridiculous amount of flour and sugar and butter, which Eric finds sweet beyond all measure-- Jack doesn't eat a single one of those things on a day to day basis, so Eric knows it's there for pie purposes. He also finds one pie pan. He makes his way down to the grocery store around the corner once Jack leaves for the rink, and picks up blueberries, Meyer lemons, apples, and three more bags of filling ingredients and disposable pie tins. Back at the condo, he sets to it.

But three pies, for Eric R. Bittle, may as well be nothing. By 11, he has a blueberry thyme, a lemon meringue, and an apple with maple sugar crust cooling on the counter, and he’s out of tins.

He checks Twitter, joins in the SMH group text to read chirps on Ransom’s photo of his seven suitcases waiting to be driven down to the Haus this week.

 **Chris Chow:** _Wow! That’s a lot! Should I pack more?_

 **Adam Birkholtz:** _Which bag has the salmon shorts, Justin? Answer now and we can do this the easy way._

 **Eric Bittle:** _I’m sure you’re good with whatever you already packed Chowder._

 **Shitty Knight:** _You’re all fuckin depressing me. Shoulda been a 5th yr senior._

 **Derek Nurse:** _I like the salmon shorts, Rans._

 **Will Poindexter:** _U would._

 **Justin Oluransi:** _Thx Nursey. Fuck all the rest of U, my legs look amaze in those shorts._

 **Shitty Knight:** _He’s not wrong._

 **Larissa Duan:** _Those shorts get U a fine, Ransom. Sorry. It’s in the bylaws._

Eric taps his phone against his chin. It’s time to research. He goes into the bedroom and stretches out on the bed with his laptop. He tells himself not to be a freak and smell Jack’s pillow, but it’s a near thing.

He opens a browser window and pulls up Google Maps and starts looking for home and furniture stores. A while later, he pulls his phone out again and starts texting Jack.

**Eric Bittle:** _So idk what your goal is with this shopping trip today but I have Plans._

He sends Jack the links to Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, Williams-Sonoma and West Elm, then starts to idly window shop. Surprisingly quickly, he gets a response.

 **Jack Zimmermann:** _I did say we were shopping._

 **Jack Zimmermann:** _I forgot about that._

**Eric Bittle:** _We don’t have to, you weren’t in your right mind._

**Jack Zimmermann:** _I still want to. I need kitchen stuff._

**Eric Bittle:** _You need all stuff. What are you doing right now?_

**Jack Zimmermann:** _Showers, changing, meeting w Kendra, home._

**Eric Bittle:** _Yay! I miss you._

**Jack Zimmermann:** _I’ve been gone five hours._

**Jack Zimmermann:** _Miss you too._

**Jack Zimmermann:** _Poots made us listen to Taylor Swift in the gym today._

**Eric Bittle:** _Which album?_

**Jack Zimmermann:** _You know I don’t know._

**Eric Bittle:** _You can sing me something off it when you get home._

**Jack Zimmermann:** _No. Maybe. Gotta go._

**Eric Bittle:** _Maybe = yes._

*

Jack gets home in the inbetween-time after lunch but before dinner. Eric suggests they grab a bite while they’re out.

“I’m paying, too,” he says, slipping his feet into his black Toms.

“I like those shoes,” Jack says. “And also, no.”

“Also _yes,_ Jack Zimmermann.” Eric reaches up and fixes a flyaway in Jack’s bangs. “You can deal with it. I’m not your... _kept boy_.”

“Gross, Bittle,” Jack says, feelingly. “Don’t say that ever again, please.”

“I won’t if you let me pay for dinner at Chipotle or whatever. Deal?”

Jack sighs. “Deal.”

So they get food and end up at Garden City Center. Jack parks the car and says, “Okay so… I don’t know what I need and I have no taste. So. You tell me.”

Eric rolls his eyes. “You have taste. Everyone has taste. It might be _bad_ but, everyone has some.”

“Lardo says I have the aesthetic sensibility of a creature that lives underground and so is blind,” Jack says, deadpan.

Eric has to cover his face and laugh for a minute. “Let me guess. The shoes.”

“The shoes,” Jack agrees heavily. “They’re just _comfortable_ and I like yellow, so what does she want from me?”

Eric snorts. “Oh, honey. I don’t mind if you wear neon yellow running shoes. It’s okay.”

“I like your shoes, though, we should get some for me while we’re here.”

Eric climbs out of the car. “Yeah? No problem, mister. What else you need? Jeans? More v-neck tees, because I’m here to tell you, those work for you and you don’t have enough of them. Let go of the crew neck, Jack, your collarbones want to breathe.”

“You could dress me, Bits,” Jack says.

Eric pauses, looking at Jack across the roof of the car. “Oh?”

“I mean...yes?”

“Um,” Eric looks away, fighting the sudden rush of inappropriately-timed arousal at the thought of literally, _physically_ dressing Jack. Button by button and zip by zip, in clothes Eric himself chose. Lord. “Yep. Okay.”

Jack chuckles as they move toward the rows of shops. “Okay,” he says, and Eric detects in his tone a certain note of _‘I know exactly what I did there.’_

The next couple of hours are a blur. Pottery Barn is a smashing success. They find throws for the sofa in the living room, and an armchair to add to the room which they schedule for delivery. Jack chooses a rug for his entryway, looking to Eric for approval. Eric shrugs and says, “It’s your condo.”

“Right,” Jack agrees. “But do you like it?”

Eric smiles. “Yeah, it’s very nice. Get it! What about these hooks and the shoe thing for that area?”

Jack nods and adds them to the delivery order without comment.

“Jack, don’t just pick them because I like them,” Eric says, poking his side. “It’s not _my_ place.”

“I like them,” Jack insists.

Eric watches him wander off to look at picture frames and thinks, _This boy. Lord save me._

They stop and find Jack a pair of grey Toms, then he lets Eric pull him into J. Crew where Eric gets to watch him try on a wardrobe’s worth of options. Jack buys two bags of clothes and is still smiling when they leave.

“You, smiling and shopping,” Eric comments. “Who knew?”

“I have good company,” Jack says. “Are you having fun?”

“Dressing you up like my personal life-sized Ken doll but hotter? Yes, Jack.” Eric shakes his head. “Are we putting a sizeable dent in your signing bonus? You haven’t really mentioned a budget.”

Jack shrugs. “I don’t have a budget for this, really. And no. The signing bonus is just fine. Look, I don’t really care about money.”

“Says the guy who has a shit ton of it,” Eric says, not unkindly. “I feel like you’re just letting me spend it, though. I want you to pick things _you_ want.”

“I like what you’re picking, and I found the rugs and the frames for the photos I want to hang up. Don’t worry about it so much, Bits.”

They wind up in Williams-Sonoma last, and Eric has to take a moment just inside the door to calm himself down.

“This is like church for me,” he tells Jack in hushed tones. “You get that, right?”

Jack smiles sideways at him. “Yeah, I get that. Find me some pans, Bits. I have like, two.”

“And one pie plate,” Eric says, absently, running his hand over a gorgeous copper Kitchenaid stand mixer as they walk through. He murmurs to it, “Hello, gorgeous,” but keeps walking, resolutely ignoring an entire section of mixers and attachments.

Eric gets Jack to really participate in choosing things this time, insisting that he won’t pick out the kitchen items on his own.

“But I don’t really cook and you do,” Jack wheedles, “so you know what you’re looking at.”

“You’re gonna have to cook eventually, and you can pick your own frying pans. March over there and get to choosing.'

Jack does, and he picks well. He adds a stock pot and a food processor to the pile they’re amassing. “My mom can send me soup recipes,” he explains. “Should be on the diets the nutritionists gave me. Come on, let’s go find pie stuff.”

Eric shakes his head, laughing. “Pie stuff, he says.”

“Yeah,” Jack insists. “I have one plate and a rolling pin. You need more than that, right?”

“Ugh,” Eric sighs. “You’re going to insist I get some ‘pie stuff’ aren’t you?”

“Yep.”

“Okay fine. Maybe an extra pie plate or two, and a heavier rolling pin would be good. And maybe some shields for top crusts. That’s it."

Jack nods. “Okay, great.”

They walk through slowly, Jack adding things here and there, and Eric refusing to make too many suggestions. They’ve done a good loop of the store when Jack pauses at the display they had passed when they came in.

“You like this, eh?” He asks, pointing to the copper Kitchenaid.

“I’m a living, breathing baker with _eyes_ , so.” Eric says, not really paying attention, scrolling through the SMH text to find out why Nursey and Dex are fighting in it. He looks up in time to see Jack raise his eyebrows meaningfully at the sales associate hovering nearby. “Jack? No.”

“But you like it, and I don’t have this kind of mixer.”

“You have a hand mixer. It’s fine,” Eric insists, going into a small panic. “You can’t buy this.”

“Why not?”

Eric lowers his voice to a furious whisper. “Jack, it’s a thousand goddamn dollars.”

“I’m getting it,” Jack states simply, and turns back to the confused saleswoman, who had halted mid-step on her way to them. “That other mixer was my mom’s from like 1989, she gave it to me with a bunch of other old stuff.”

“Do not buy that Kitchenaid,” Eric hisses, but Jack is already asking the sales associate to add one to his order.

Eric, suddenly feeling overheated and lightheaded, walks out of Williams-Sonoma.

*

Jack finds him a couple minutes later leaning up against the side of a store around the corner. It’s a shady spot, not in the way of any foot traffic, and Eric is breathing.

“Bits?”

“Jack, just…” Eric sighs. “I mean, don’t go away or anything but come here and don’t tell me you’re getting the mixer right now.”

“Alright,” Jack says, cautious, and approaches Eric’s side. “You’re mad.”

Eric lets out a helpless laugh at that. “I’m not _mad_ , Jack. You’re being… very sweet. But I need to you reel it in. Just… reel it in a little.”

“Bits. _Eric_. If this is too much too soon, I get that. I shouldn’t have asked you to do this, it’s not your problem, I just… I don’t know. If you don’t want to pick this stuff out, please, you don’t have to.”

Eric throws up his hands, pushes off the wall, and says, “ _Of course_ I want to help. I want you to come home to a nice place, not a beige box. I want you to put your personality in that place and I want to help you do it. I want you to think of me every time you look at that stupid, overpriced _shoe rack_ , because I was there when you bought it. And when you use the fuzzy grey blanket, I want you to remember we picked it out together and then went home and snuggled up under it. Because I won’t _be there_ , Jack. We have one more day and then--”

Eric chokes and turns away, squeezing his eyes shut and willing the burn in them to pass so he doesn’t _actually cry_ at this strip mall.

“Eric,” Jack says, soft as anything, and reaches out. Eric winces at the fingers stroking down his arm. He’s really going to cry. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Eric tells him. “You didn’t do anything.”

Jack tugs at Eric’s wrist, gets him to turn around, then pulls him in for a hug.

“We’re at a mall,” Eric says, but doesn’t fight it.

“No one is looking at us, and no one is going to recognize me standing halfway behind a Talbots, Bitty.” Jack pulls back and kisses him, soft and quick. “You know I don’t like that you’re leaving soon, either.”

“I know.”

“I want to get the mixer so when you come back it’s there for you,” Jack continues. “So just let me.”

“Okay,” Eric agrees, rolling his eyes skyward and biting his lip to hold the frustrated, sad, happy, confused tears that want to fall at bay.

Jack reaches up and swipes away what does manage to roll down Eric’s cheeks. “Don’t cry, bud, it’s just a mixer.”

Eric laughs _and_ sobs at that one. “Oh my God, it’s not just a mixer, and you _know it_ . It’s a _really good mixer._ ”

“It’s pretty fancy,” Jack agrees. He waits for Eric to get it together enough to look him in the eye, then says, “This is gonna be hard, Bits.”

“Yeah,” Eric nods. “I guess I just didn’t really...get it. Till today. This week is almost over. The semester starts soon and there are new tadpoles starting on the team next week and I have to do the tour instead of Shitty, and you aren’t there anymore. I’ve been freaking out, and I didn’t know it.”

“I know. Trust me, Bits, I get it. You think I don't sit and wonder what I'll do without you on my line this season?”

Eric has half a mind to protest _that;_ he's not a bad winger but he's not NHL material by any means. Jack holds him by his hip, by the back of his neck, gives both a little squeeze. “But I’ll be dropping by the Haus in a couple weeks, then you’ll be back here the week after. We have the next two months all figured out. We’ll figure the rest out later, and it will be _okay_.”

“I know.”

“I had you pick most of this stuff out today because I wanted to think of you when I looked at it, too. Like you said.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, really. Plus… you’ll be here a lot, hopefully, and I want you to like being here.”

“Jack Zimmermann. If you lived in a cardboard _box--_ ”

“You would hate it, no kitchen,” Jack chirps gently.

Eric shakes his head. “No, I would love it, if you were there.”

Jack pinches Eric’s hip lightly. “You’re so sentimental, Bits.”

“Shut up.”

“Okay,” Jack agrees easily, and kisses him again, longer this time. “Come on, let’s go get my mixer.”

Eric huffs. “Because you’re really gonna use it _ever_.”

“Hey,” Jack protests, bumping their shoulders as they turn back toward the storefronts. “Don’t limit me, Bittle, you never know.”

  
Eric shakes his head, bumps Jack back, and wishes time would slow down, just for a couple days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter got heavy on us, and I'm sorry about that, guys. 
> 
> Up next: Porn break! (I think we all need it)


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promised y'all a porn break, didn't I? 
> 
> As usual, gotta thank the three awesome people reading this as I write, pointing out mistakes and cheering me on. DoubleNegative, leftwinglibrarian, and kisahawklin have all been THE BEST! Thanks, guys!

Jack had cleared his schedule that week as much as he could already, so he is thrilled to wake up the next morning to an email saying George has been waylaid on a trip.  It means Jack’s meeting with her has been cancelled and that a light Wednesday has turned into a completely open one. It means Jack can spend all of it with Bitty.  

Jack decides to skip optional skate in favor of lying in bed with Bitty, lazily jerking each other off in the early morning light followed by the kind of aimless, unhurried making out Jack has never been able to indulge in with anyone before. He can’t remember if it ever felt this good with anyone else, with Parse. He can’t remember, so that’s probably his answer right there. 

The morning stretches on, long and perfect. Jack waits as long as he can to break the spell-- but then his growling stomach does it for him. He and Bitty pull themselves apart for breakfast.

“I’m a bad influence on you,” Bitty laments over coffee and omelettes, which Jack insists on making while Bitty sits and watches. “You  _ never _ skip anything, and here you are skipping  _ everything _ this week.” 

Jack shrugs, cracking one last egg into a bowl. “The meeting got cancelled, I didn't skip it. Besides, I can afford the break this week. Next week is when things get really crazy. Lots of guys are stepping it down right now so they're not exhausted. It’s fine.”

Bitty  _ hmm _ s to himself, taps at his phone on the island in front of him. Jack has learned over the last couple of years that this response is usually Bitty’s way of ending a conversation he doesn't like, or one he thinks contains less than the truth. He doesn't push it; telling Bitty not to worry would get him nowhere.

“So what do you want to do today?” Bitty asks eventually, shutting his phone off and setting it aside.

Jack keeps his face turned away, suddenly shy. “Eat these. Shower. Back to bed. Maybe for the rest of the day.”

He hears Bitty’s breath hitch, but no words are forthcoming. Jack adds cheese to the sizzling omelette on the stove and folds it over. He waits to see if Bitty will say something -- make a joke, flirt back, protest, anything. But he stays silent, and when Jack glances over his shoulder, Bitty is just watching him cook, considering him from his perch at the island with a faint blush spreading over his cheeks. 

Things have been quiet between them, since yesterday. Bitty had baked for hours when they got back to the condo, while Jack watched tape of old Falconers games and took notes. Jack had tried to get him to come sit with him, had offered to help in the kitchen. But Bitty had kept his distance until he had baked away whatever strain still weighed on him.

They had fallen into bed, exhausted and drained, but holding each other. Jack is determined not to let the rest of the visit -- this one last day -- be so heavy with tension. He had intentionally started the day with something purely indulgent and physical, and had just as intentionally steered Bitty away from doing all the work and taking care of Jack all morning. 

He thinks it’s working, that he might have succeeded in making this day what he wished the whole week could have been -- the perfect, isolated bubble, just them on the inside of it, the rest of the world outside and unable to intrude. 

“I’ve been thinking,” Jack says, keeping his voice neutral as he flips the eggs one more time. “I really want...if you’re interested--”

“Whatever it is, I’m interested.”

Jack turns to look at Bitty again. He’s staring resolutely down at his phone, screen still dark, but a blush is spreading down his neck. Jack smirks. “Okay, then.” 

He turns the omelette onto a plate, which he sets down to the left of Bitty’s phone. 

Bitty looks up, finally. “Aren’t you going to tell me what you really want? You didn’t finish your sentence.”

“Eat your protein, Bittle,” Jack says. “You’ll need it.”

He feels a rush of smug satisfaction when Bitty fumbles as he tries to grab his fork. Jack leans over the island and presses a kiss to Bitty’s temple.

“Thank you for breakfast,” Bitty says quietly.

“It’s no problem,” Jack replies. “Let me feed you for once, eh?”

Bitty leans his head against his hand, cutting up his eggs with the side of his fork. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Please,” Jack says. “We both know which one of us lucked out, here.”

Bitty shakes his head. “Go make your eggs now. I want a shower.”

“You’re so bossy,” Jack says, without a hint of heat in it. 

Bitty says, “You love it.”

Jack  _ really  _ does.

*

The shower really had no chance at being anything other than foreplay, Jack thinks a little while later as he’s pressing Bitty back against the tiles and sliding against him with his teeth closed over the warm, wet, clean skin just below Bitty’s ear. 

Bitty gasps, tilting his head back against the wall, and jerks his hips forward. Jack answers with a groan, letting Bitty’s movements dictate the pace, the friction against his own cock where it slides against the cut of muscle above Bitty’s hipbone. 

“Do you want to fuck me?” Bitty guesses breathlessly. “Is that what it is? Because yes.”

“Well,” Jack replies, “I was thinking, you know, the other way around. But...”

He runs a soapy hand across Bitty’s chest, sliding his fingers until he finds a nipple, and pinches lightly. Bitty keens, and Jack uses his other hand to tilt Bitty’s face where he wants it, so he can catch the sound in a kiss that starts filthy and stays there for a long moment. 

Jack abandons Bitty’s nipple after a couple more teasing strokes and slides the same hand around to Bitty’s ass, letting his finger trail down between the cheeks. Bitty moves, maybe unconsciously, onto his toes and clutches at Jack’s shoulders. 

“We can do whatever you want, though,” Jack says. “Maybe, since you’ve never… You could let me just...touch you here, see if you like it.”

Bitty shudders. “I’ll like it,” he says. “I told you, I’ve...y’know. Tried it out.”

“It’s different when it’s someone else,” Jack says, slipping his finger up and then back down, this time brushing gently over Bitty’s hole. “But we have all day, Bits. Sky’s the limit.”

Bitty lets out a sort of half-laugh-half-whimper, clutching at Jack’s shoulders and blinking water out of his eyes, head tilted back to look up at Jack. “You and your motivational phrases.”

“I’m not gonna say a Gretzky quote during sex, Bittle, so don’t ask.” 

Bitty full-on laughs at that, then cuts it off with a strangled sound when Jack presses his finger, slick from soap but probably not sufficient for this, just enough to slip ever so slightly inside. “Oh, my god.” 

Jack teases him, withdraws his finger and traces it in circles, presses a little but never all the way in. Bitty shivers. 

“Jack,” he says, leaning his forehead against Jack’s chest.

_ He really is so short _ , Jack thinks. Remembers saying something to that effect the other day when he was still a little drunk, and Bitty’s dark, outraged flush at what he thought was a chirp. But Jack loves it, the compact way Bitty’s muscles are arranged on his frame, so much smaller than Jack’s. Loves that Bitty is faster than him, more graceful. Can’t get enough of his hands or thighs or hip bones, will probably lie awake at night once Bitty leaves, thinking of the way Bitty can sit cross-legged on Jack’s back while he does push-ups. It’ll probably make him even crazier, when they aren’t occupying the same space anymore, that this small person has filled up all his empty spaces.

Jack withdraws his hand, and just pulls Bitty in, wrapping his arms around Bitty’s shoulders and holding him under the hot spray of water where they can breathe the same air for just a little longer. 

“We should get out of the shower,” Jack says. Bitty says nothing, just reaches over to turn off the water. 

They barely stop to dry off. Jack gets Bitty through the bathroom door and across the hallway into the bedroom without pausing the next kiss. It’s not frantic or desperate, not today. Jack could kiss Bitty like this for hours on end if they had time, and today they actually do. It’s like they’re not even trying to finesse it anymore, or race any sort of clock, or chase any specific goal.  They tumble onto the bed and Jack takes a moment to grab lube and condoms out of the bedside table and toss them onto the duvet. 

Bitty pulls Jack down and into the space between his spread legs, pushing up in search of friction. Jack reaches to take them both in hand, stroking them together while he does his damnedest to devour Bitty in that kiss. It’s not enough, and Jack thinks wildly that nothing will be enough, they can’t get close enough, can’t touch in enough places all at once. 

Kisses follow each other in a breathless cascade, and Jack can’t stop moving his hips against Bitty’s, each stroke together punching noises from Jack’s chest, drawing gasps from Bitty’s lips. It’s like swimming through syrup. It’s like suffocating and  _ liking  _ it. 

“Touch me,” Bitty says, his voice dropping into a low register Jack has only heard from him when they’re having sex. He loves that, the fact that he has an effect like that on Bitty. Bitty says it again. “Jack. Touch me. Please, will you?”

Jack pulls back, sitting up and reaching for the lube.  _ Anything _ , he would do anything Bitty asked of him right now. “Scoot up,” he says, nodding his head toward the pillows. “And lean back.”

Bitty does, but he looks nervous, or embarrassed, so Jack runs his hands down his sides, along his arms, down his legs to his knees, then presses them to the inside of Bitty’s thighs.

“Open up for me,” Jack murmurs. 

Bitty goes bright red and covers his face with both hands. “ _ Fuck _ , you can’t say stuff like that while you’re looking at me like that, Jack, I swear to god.”

“Shh,” Jack soothes, reaching with one hand to guide Bitty’s hands away. “Come on.”

It looks like it takes Bitty some effort to look Jack in the eye, but he manages it, and lets his legs fall apart. Jack squeezes lube onto his fingers and sets the bottle by his own knee so he can grab it if he needs it. He rubs the fingers of both hands together, then wraps one around Bitty’s cock.

“You good, Bits?”

Bitty nods. “Yeah. I feel… ridiculous. But I want… just. Yes.”

“You don't  _ look _ ridiculous,” Jack says. “You look amazing, just trust me.”

“I do trust you.”

Jack strokes him once, twice, then slowly presses one finger inside on the upstroke. 

“Ah,” Bitty gasps, body twitching in surprise. 

“Try to relax,” Jack says gently. “Don’t tense up, I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You’re not.”

Jack slides the finger forward, presses up to see what Bitty does. He looks uncomfortable but not turned off. Jack keeps up the slow strokes with his other hand, and moves his finger out a little before pressing gently back in. “So tight,” he murmurs. 

“Yeah,” Bitty says, strained, then bites his lip. “It feels...weird.”

Jack nods. “It will, at first.”

Bitty watches Jack’s face and Jack watches him back. Eventually, he starts to talk quietly, hoping it will help break the tension, help Bitty stop tensing up. 

“You're gorgeous,” he says. “You know, I always thought so. You always drove me crazy, Bits.”

“Lies,” Bitty replies. He rolls his hips down on Jack’s hand experimentally and groans. “You didn't like me at first, and you thought I was too small.”

Jack kisses his knee. “I wasn't very nice. I'm sorry. But I liked you. I was jealous of you. You're so… everyone loved you right away. Everyone. And I was a mess, you know that. So angry back then, still. But you were… the opposite of me in pretty much every way.  And I thought you were so cute. It… I didn't react well.”

Bitty laughs at that. “You jerk,” he says. “That's not how cute aggression is supposed to work.”

“That’s for baby chipmunks, Bittle. You're not a tiny woodland creature. Well, I don't think you are, most days,” Jack chirps. He keeps his movements small and gentle, starts to press kisses down the inside of Eric’s thigh. “It wasn’t aggression so much as frustration, anyway. Still sorry.”

Distracting him a little was the right thing to do. Bitty moves with him, a hot red flush staining his cheeks, down his throat and across his chest. 

“You still with me, Bits? You want more?”

Bitty makes a choked off sound. “Yes. Your accent gets stronger when we’re like this, you know?”

“I'm concentrating on other things,” Jack tells him. He adds a little more lube and tries two fingers. “I can't believe you put up with me,” he says as he slides them in slowly. “I can't believe I get this now.”

“Jack,” Bitty moans. “You could've had me anytime, you have to have known that.”

Bitty’s chest heaves as he adjusts to the stretch. Jack murmurs nonsense to him, twists his fingers a little, tries scissoring them slowly, strokes out, then back in. Crooks his fingers and finds--

“ _ Fuck _ ,” Bitty shouts into the hot air between them. “That’s it.”

“Mmm,” Jack agrees, doing it again. He leans up, kisses Bitty gently on the mouth, then moves back down so he can get his lips around Bitty’s cock and slide them down as his fingers slide in _.  _ The sounds Bitty makes then, Jack thinks could make him come without being touched if he hadn’t already just a few hours ago. 

Jack runs his free hand around to Bitty’s hip and then down his thigh to his knee. He shows Bitty with gentle pressure that he wants the leg hooked over his shoulder, and Bitty lets himself be arranged. Jack uses the new position to push Bitty’s leg higher and really thrust his fingers, eliciting more torn-out moans and soft, broken whimpers. Jack applies himself to sucking cock like he never has before which is saying something, if he’s honest with himself. 

“H-harder,” Bitty pleads.

He looks up Bitty’s body and shudders at the way Bitty’s eyes are darkened, a little wild, the broken-open way he looks down at Jack. Bitty has both hands curled around the headboard, arms stretched over his head, muscles tight from the grip he must have on it. 

“You sure, Bits?” 

“Ye-es,” Bitty whines, voice hitching as Jack curls his fingers again and again on the way out. “Come on, Jack.”

Jack nips the inside of Bitty’s knee and gets back to where he’d been, swallowing him down and moving his fingers again, this time putting a little more strength behind each push in and upward. 

“ _ Jack, _ ” Bitty cries. “Jack, Jack, Jack--”

Jack moans around the cock in his mouth, wishes he had some kind of friction on himself because this is  _ unreal _ , it's so good. He twists his wrist with each thrust, and Bitty dissolves into wordless, desperate sounds above him. Jack looks up through his lashes. Bitty meets his gaze, eyes incredulous, mouth hanging open on a silent exhalation. Jack can hear his hands making the headboard creak in their grasp. He’s almost there, Jack can tell. He pops his mouth off again, replaces it with his hand. He’s gotten so sloppy, his chin must be shining with spit and lube at this point; his hand is almost dripping with it. 

But Bitty. Bitty looks like a dream made real. He's lost any trace of self-consciousness at this point, body stretched out and legs splayed open, hanging onto the headboard and writhing around Jack’s fingers. 

“God, Eric, you're so hot,” he blurts, “you look amazing right now, you don’t even know… I wanna make you come, where do you want it?”

Eric throws his head back with a groan, his hips moving in tiny jerks in time to the movements of Jack’s hands. “What are you asking me?” 

“What do you  _ want? _ ” Jack says, insistent. “Come in my mouth, in my hand, fuck, Bits, on my face, whatever you  _ want. _ ”

Bitty practically sobs, his body twisting helplessly against the sheets, like he's reaching for something.

“Jack,” he gasps, “you would want--”

“Anything you'll give me,” Jack says, with a hard stroke and thrust.

Bitty lets out a strangled cry. “Your mouth, please, god, just, now, please--”

Jack jerks him hard, fast, seals his mouth over the head and fucks into him as hard as he's willing without a lot more practice. Bitty rambles on in a string of profanity and pleas, then goes silent as he comes. Jack keeps his eyes open so he can watch Bitty’s head tip back, and his body bow off the bed. 

_ I did that, _ Jack thinks as he swallows, gentling his fingers and slowly withdrawing them as he slides his mouth away. 

They're silent; the only sounds in the room are Bitty’s ragged breaths. He lets go of the headboard and winces. Jack swipes at his face with one hand, then wipes that on the duvet. He's gonna have to wash it for the second time that week, he thinks absently. Bitty clears his throat.

“Jack?”

“I'm still here,” Jack says, crawling up the bed so he can stretch out beside him. “You doing okay?”

“I’m gonna need a couple minutes,” Bitty replies. “But I’m good. Great. Just, a little out of it.”

“Good,” Jack says. He brings a hand up to the join of Bitty’s neck and shoulder, gives him a squeeze, massaging the muscle gently. Bitty moves his face forward for a kiss and Jack shifts back minutely. “I probably taste like lube.”

“Like I care,” Bitty snips. “Get back here.”

Jack shifts his face forward again and Bitty kisses him. When they pull apart he says, “That was so good, Jack. My legs are shaking.”

“You’re not sore?”

“I don’t think so,” Bitty says. He shifts, moving his lower body experimentally. “Maybe tomorrow I will be, but not in a bad way. I still… I want you to actually fuck me. I want to know what that feels like, and I want to… remember it. Later.”

“Whenever you’re ready to go again,” Jack says. 

Bitty snorts and presses his face into Jack’s shoulder. “Lord. You weren’t kidding when you said you wanted to keep me in bed all day, huh?”

“We don’t have to,” Jack says. “I mean, we have to leave to get lunch at some point, but. If you want, we can come right back here. I want to spend as much time touching you today as I can. But it doesn’t have to be sex, Bits. I just. Want to touch you.”

“Saving it all for the bank account, hm?”

Jack smiles, remembering their conversation from before Bitty left Madison to come visit. “Pretty much.”

“I want to stay in bed with you all day,” Bitty says softly. “Of course I do. Let’s do that.”

Jack pulls him close, wraps an arm over his waist and tangles their legs. “Okay.”

After a moment, Bitty says, “You’re still hard? Why didn’t you say something, I was so _out_ _of it_ \--”

“I’m not in a hurry,”Jack assures him. He shifts a little against Bitty, sighs at the pressure of Bitty’s thigh against his cock. “You don’t have to do anything, just lay here with me. Rest.”

“Okay,” Bitty whispers, tucking his face into Jack’s neck. “Just for a few minutes.”

*

Bitty falls asleep. Jack watches him for a while, then closes his own eyes. He drifts between wakefulness and sleep, blinking his eyes open drowsily when Bitty moves a little, or when he hears a siren from somewhere close by. 

His thoughts are slow. He's maybe half-hard now, and not really inclined to do anything about it. He’s more than happy to wait for Bitty to wake up again. In the meantime he thinks about how things are going to be tomorrow, when he has to drive Bitty down to Samwell. They won't see each other again for three weeks, and then a charity event will mean Jack has to leave after two nights and one full day. Those three weeks will be long, and two nights won’t seem like much. This is what has been sitting in Bitty’s head for days while Jack was oblivious. 

Jack sighs heavily and Bitty stirs, cracking one eye. 

“I’m falling asleep,” he says, stretching out on his stomach, pointing his toes. “Sorry.”

Jack props up on one elbow to watch him appreciatively as he flexes his calves. “You were fully asleep, Bits. But only for a little bit.”

“Mmm.” Bitty rolls onto his back and tugs Jack over. “Sorry. Kiss me?”

Jack laughs, slides himself between Bitty’s legs, then leans down to brush his lips against Bitty’s. He reaches up with one hand to push Bitty’s hair off his forehead. “You have bed head.”

“Your fault,” Bitty says. He pushes his head into Jack’s hand, kind of like a cat, and pulls him down for a deeper kiss this time. Jack pushes away the thoughts that had been weighing on his mind. He can do what Bitty said - save this up, store it for when they can’t be together like this. Jack threads his fingers deeper into Bitty’s hair, frames Bitty’s jaw with his other hand, and tries to burn the taste of Bitty’s lips into his memory. 

Bitty reaches down and runs his fingers along the length of Jack’s cock. 

“You let me fall asleep without returning the favor,” he says against Jack’s mouth. 

Jack doesn’t answer that. He just uses the hand in Bitty’s hair to tip his head back, trails kisses down Bitty’s jaw and neck. Bitty closes his fingers in a warm grip around Jack’s cock, strokes him to coax him the rest of the way to hard. Jack thrusts down into Bitty’s fist with a groan and sinks his teeth gently into Bitty’s shoulder. 

“I still want you to fuck me,” Bitty gasps. “Will you?”

“Still not sore?”

“I’m  _ fine _ .”

Jack sits up, kneeling between Bitty’s legs. Bitty pumps his fist, slow and tight, and Jack lets himself push into it a couple more times. He looks down at Bitty. He’s mostly soft, still, but he did just have a fairly intense orgasm less than an hour ago.

“Now?” Jack asks, just to be sure and, he admits it, to make Bitty make the face he’s making now. 

It’s an impatient scowl, the one that over the years has been often punctuated with Jack’s full name and Bitty’s arms crossed over his chest. Jack loves it, kind of always has. Bitty’s never really mad at him when he makes that face. Jack thinks it’s cute. He will  _ never _ say this out loud, because then the  _ real  _ mad-face will come out and  _ that _ face is the one Jack finds absolutely  _ terrifying.  _

“I'm teasing. Mostly,” Jack says. “I'm… nervous.”

Bitty smiles at him in that way he has, when he think someone is being cute but stupid. “Why are you nervous?”

“Um.” Jack runs his hands over Bitty’s legs for something to do with them. “It's been awhile since I did this with anyone? And uh… I mean. The first time for me wasn't great.” Jack shakes his head at the alarmed look in Bitty’s eyes. “It wasn't  _ bad,  _ I mean, it's not like I wasn't  _ willing _ . It was just… painful. We were 17 and stupid and clueless, but. I don't want you to have a memory like that.”

Bitty’s face melts back into a fond smile. “Okay. So I won’t.”

He reaches for Jack, and Jack goes. Of course he goes. He falls into a kiss and lets Bitty take the lead. Bitty’s fingers dig into his scalp, scratch lightly down his neck, over his back. He doesn’t change the pace or depth of the kiss, but waits for Bitty, who does it gradually, teasingly, like his fingers on Jack’s ribs. Eventually Bitty sees fit to return one hand to Jack’s cock. 

Bitty hooks a leg around Jack’s and rolls them over then, and sits atop Jack’s thighs to watch his own hand working Jack’s foreskin, squeezing just a little, twisting around the head. Jack watches Bitty watching his own hand, mesmerized. 

“Are the condoms still somewhere in the bed?” Bitty asks, casting around for them.

“I think they fell off the side, before,” Jack says, stilling the hitching of his hips while he waits for Bitty to reach over and get them.

“I've never actually put one of these on, before,” Bitty says, tearing one off the strip and holding it out to Jack. 

Jack takes it, letting their fingers brush. “It's easy.”

He opens and rolls the condom on, going slow for Bitty’s benefit. “They didn't teach you in school?”

“In Georgia? Ha. No.” Bitty shakes his head and reaches for the lube. “So. What, um.”

Jack snags the lube from him, then tugs Bitty by the arm. “Come up here a little. Hold out your hand.”

Bitty shifts up, straddling Jack’s lap, and does as told. Jack squeezes some lube into Bitty’s hand.

“That's for me,” he says, then coats his own fingers. “This is for you.”

He reaches down and has to bite his lip when he finds the leftover slick from earlier, the way Bitty is already a little open for him, no resistance when he slides a finger in. Bitty slides his hand over Jack, spreads the lube down and slides back up. They stare at each other, almost shocked, as Jack pushes three fingers into him.

“Okay?”

Bitty nods on a hitched breath. “A little bit, um…”

“Does it hurt?”

“Not in a bad way.”

Jack twists his fingers and Bitty cries out. His face looks a little pained, but he grinds down on the fingers, twitches when Jack, purely out of luck from this angle, brushes his prostate. 

“We should do it this way,”Jack says. “It'll let you control it and… I get to watch.”

Bitty flushes and smiles down at him. “Okay, baby. Whatever you want.”

Jack is generous with the lube, waits until Bitty is hard again and pushing down to meet his fingers with each thrust up before he holds Bitty still with a hand on his hip and takes his hand away. 

“Come on, Bits,” he murmurs, shoving himself up against the pillows so he can sit up. He catches Bitty’s mouth in a kiss, and guides his hips so they line up. He reaches down to hold himself in place, brushes the head of his cock over Bitty’s hole. “Ready?”

Bitty nods, shudders, and places both hands on Jack’s shoulders. Jack watches his face as he sinks down, sees the way his eyes widen at the pressure. Jack holds his breath and tells himself not to move, not to press up like he so desperately wants. Bitty moves again, and Jack feels resistance give way as he slides inside. 

Jack doesn’t mean to say anything, or make even a sound. He means to stay silent, let Bitty focus on himself, let him figure it out. But it feels unbelievably good,  _ finally _ , and Jack says, “God, Bits, I--” He bites hard on the inside of his cheek.  _ Do not say  _ I love you  _ with your dick in his ass, you  _ know better  _ than that _ . “I can’t believe how good you feel.”

Bitty is  _ shaking _ , Jack realizes. He reaches up and takes Bitty’s face in his hands. “Go slow. Relax. Bits,  _ breathe _ .”

Bitty lets out a shaky exhalation and sinks down further, lets out a long, low sound from deep in his chest. “Jack…”

“You’re doing so good, Bits,” Jack rambles on. “Tell me what I can do for you.”

“J-just…” Bitty rolls his hips, experimentally, and shudders again, hard. He leans forward and presses their foreheads together. “This is…”

Jack moves his hands to Bitty’s ass and squeezes gently. The urge to move him, to push deeper, is almost overwhelming. But Bitty does it for him, pushes down into Jack’s hands and whines.

“This is a lot,” Bitty finishes, breathing hard against Jack’s mouth. Jack kisses him, eyes squeezed shut. 

“Yeah,” Jack bites out, as Bitty moves his hips, the same way he had against Jack’s fingers. Jack curses under his breath, his own hips twitching up without his meaning to.

Bitty laughs. “Was that French?”

“Ah,” Jack huffs. “Probably.”

“I like when you forget to speak English,” Bitty says, a little breathless as he moves, riding Jack in shallow thrusts. Jack wraps his arms around him and holds on, holds still, finds whatever skin he can get his mouth on. 

Bitty gets into a rhythm. It's slow, but so good, all Jack can do is pant helplessly into his skin.

“Jack,” Bitty says. “Jack, you can… you can move. Help me out here, I don't know what I'm--” 

Jack curls his arms around Bitty’s, gets his hands on his shoulders. He thrusts up, just a little, meeting Bitty as he rolls his hips down. They cry out together, and Bitty’s fingers bite into Jack’s back.

“ _ Yes, _ ” he says through his teeth. “Do that again.”

They move together like that, clinging and pulling back for open-mouthed kisses that can't connect for long if they want to breathe. 

Jack says, “Bits, I'm not gonna last long, can you come like this?”

“I probably could,” Bitty pants. “But. Twice already today so. Maybe not this time. Come for me, though, I want you to come while you're inside me, Jack, you should--”

“ _ Crisse _ ,” Jack mutters. “Yes, Bits, just--”

He holds Bitty still and gets his own feet flat on the bed. He tries to thrust up as gently as he can. 

“Don't,” Bitty says. “I don't need gentle, Jack. Do it, come on.”

Jack looks up into Bitty’s eyes, a little wild around the edges, and nods. When he moves again, it's harder, faster, his fingers gripping Bitty’s ass just this side of too hard. 

He gets lost, for awhile, in the feeling of it, the sensory overload. Bitty keeps up a steady stream of broken noises and babble in Jack’s ear, but he can barely hear it, all his focus on the amazing friction around his cock, the way Bitty’s forehead is damp with sweat and pressed to Jack’s, and the overwhelming  _ love _ and all-out  _ lust  _ coursing through his veins.

His orgasm hits him like a check he doesn't see coming. Jack shouts into Bitty’s hair and stills with his hands scrabbling across Bitty’s lower back. 

Jack thinks he hears Bitty laugh. Bitty pets his hair, kisses him over and over. Jack collapses back against the headboard, drawing Bitty with him. “Bits, I--”

“That was a thing that we did,” Bitty mumbles, and Jack laughs. “Lord.”

“Wanna make you come again,” Jack says, foggy and slow. “Your turn.”

“Okay, baby,” Bitty says. “Later. This was amazing, but I just can’t. Almost, there, for a second but… we should grab lunch and revisit this.”

Jack nods, “Okay. I should probably, um…”

Bitty laughs at him again. “You’re a little dumb right after, huh? I’ll get us cleaned up. You just… reboot.”

Jack helps out a little, holds onto the condom when Bitty lifts off him with a slight wince, takes it off and knots it. Bitty takes it away to the bathroom, comes back with a warm washcloth and wipes them down. 

“Gonna need another shower,” Jack says, slowly getting his brain back online. 

Bitty stands naked at the foot of the bed, fists on his hips. “And we really need to do laundry,” he says with a wrinkle of his nose. 

Jack sits up, crawls to the edge of the bed, and pulls Bitty in. Presses his head to Bitty’s chest, and feels fingers in his hair.  _ I love you _ , he thinks, but before he can open his mouth, Bitty is talking again.

“Should we order in? Sushi? What do you think?”

Jack presses a kiss to Bitty’s collarbone, almost as an apology for not being brave enough to just say it already, and says, “Sushi sounds amazing.”

*

Later, Jack has Bitty stretched out over him on the sofa, the remains of their lunch strewn across the coffee table and  _ The Cutting Edge _ playing on the TV Jack rarely ever uses. 

“This movie,” Bitty sighs. 

“Pretty unrealistic, though,” Jack comments. “I mean. There’s no way you go from hockey to figure skating in a year. I don’t think I could.”

“I went from figure skating to hockey,” Bitty reminds him. 

“Well yeah, but that’s like… you had to what? Put on a little more muscle and let yourself get checked, right?”

“Yeah, and?”

“So you already had amazing speed and coordination. To be honest, you’re wasted on us, Bits. You switching to hockey was a  _ step down _ in terms of your skills, let’s be honest. Do you really think I could get 215 pounds of  _ me  _ off the ice and into the air,  _ do a spin _ , and then land on one foot?”

Bitty cracks up at that, shaking against Jack’s chest and hiding his face for a moment. “Oh, my God. Well. First of all… it sounds like you just knocked hockey and I’m frankly shocked right now. Pinch me, because this can’t be real life, okay, okay,” Bitty breaks off, laughing again as Jack digs his fingers into Bitty’s ribs. “Second of all,” Bitty continues, “I have done a toe loop  _ in hockey pads on an uneven pond _ . I’ve done it in front of you! I bet you could do it if we worked at it.”

Jack throws a hand out to the TV. “Could I do it on a nationally competitive level  _ in a year _ ?”

“Just hush, Jack,” Bitty says, giving him a light smack on the arm. “This movie gave me  _ life  _ when I was little. Mama loved it, and we would watch it all the time. It’s fluff. Unrealistic fluff. With figure skating. And a little hockey.”

“ _ Very _ little hockey,” Jack fake-grumbles. 

“Keep talking and I’ll make figure skating lessons for you a reality  _ and _ I’ll film them,  _ and _ I’ll send them to the group text.”

Jack says, “You know I’d do whatever you asked me to do, Bits. Can’t believe you’d play me like that.”

“ _ The Cutting Edge  _ is sacred. As is  _ Ice Castles. _ ”

“Never seen it,” Jack says. 

Bitty gives him a scathing look. “That’s it, we’re breaking up.”

Jack shakes his head and pulls him up for a kiss. “Just put it on next, Bits.”

“Really?”

“Sure.”

Bitty knocks him over with another smile and says, “Okay.”

Jack gathers him close and watches the skaters on screen scream at each other, feels the contented sigh that sways Bitty’s body and echoes it with one of his own. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next: Mini-roadie to see Shitty! Moving into the Haus! And, what I am pretty sure is the final chapter in this fic.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it, y'all! The final chapter. There will be more to this series. I think next I will do a episode tag for Me and Jack, and I have something in mind for the holidays, so please stay tuned!
> 
> Huge thanks and hugs to leftwinglibrarian, DoubleNegative, and kisahawklin. They have caught my missing commas, fixed my poor word choices, and cheered me on with such enthusiasm, I just can't even. <3

Eric wakes on Thursday morning feeling as though he had run a marathon the day before. He knows before he opens his eyes, as he rolls to his side, that his thighs are going to kill him without some serious stretches this morning. Jack is already up and out of bed; Eric can hear the shower running. He moves again and winces at the pull in his muscles.

_ Note to self,  _ he thinks.  _ Forget training. Sex marathons do the same damn thing. _

Eric lets himself lie in bed for a little while longer, lets his mind wander over the previous day and process the fact that yes, this is currently his life. The sheets smell like fabric softener now, having been changed before they collapsed into bed, finally, late that night. 

Eric had looked at the ones currently in the laundry and said, “I really hope lube comes out in the wash. You might have to throw these away.”

Jack had snorted and said, “It’s water-based.”

Now, Eric feels the burn in his thighs, in his abs, definitely in his glutes, as he sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed. “Wow,” he says to the empty room. “Okay.”

He makes his way to the bathroom, opening the door to a wall of steam and the sound of Jack humming under his breath.

“Honey?” Eric shuts the door behind him and strips out of his briefs.

“Come in here,” Jack replies. “I've been waiting for you.”

Eric laughs, shaking his head. “Sorry, I must have been out like a light.” He slides open the shower door and steps inside. “You wore me out yesterday.”

Jack pulls him in for a kiss and says, “Same. Best day though, eh?”

“Best day,” Eric agrees, kissing him again close-mouthed. “I'll give you a better one after I brush my teeth.”

Jack hands him the shampoo and says, “I don't care about morning breath.”

“Well I do,” Eric protests. “Anyway, we can't start something in the shower this morning. We have to leave by 11.”

“True,” Jack sighs. He traces an absent pattern on Eric’s hip, watching him get his hair wet. “How are you this morning?”

“I feel like I spent all day yesterday on horseback and then did five hours of Katya’s Russian calisthenics. You?”

Jack chuckles at that. “Ah, I'm doing a little better than that. Are you very sore? Too sore, I mean?”

“No, baby,” Eric says softly. It kind of kills him that Jack is this worried about it. He cringes to think of how uncomfortable Jack’s first time must have been for him to be this concerned. “I feel amazing, actually. Like I got in a really good workout.”

Jack smirks and pulls him in again, pressing kisses to his forehead, his cheek, his chin, his neck. Eric sighs. 

“Don't do that,” he says weakly. 

“I'm not aiming for anything, I just want to kiss you. Anywhere will do.” Jack releases him and reaches for his shower gel. “Last night was amazing, Bits. Thank you.”

Eric is glad for the heat of the shower, hoping it does enough to mask the flush on his face.

Last night, after Jack had talked through Ice Castles and they had demolished most of the apple maple pie, Jack had flicked off the TV, turned to Eric and said,  _ “So I think you should fuck me now,”  _ like he was suggesting they go for a walk, or watch another movie. Eric had nearly stroked out, he's sure of it. But he had said “ _ Yes, _ ” right away, and moments later had ended up two fingers deep in Jack Zimmermann’s legendary ass.

Now, Jack says, “Sorry, I embarrassed you, I didn't mean--”

“I'm not embarrassed,” Eric interrupts. “I'm just… a little overcome with mental images right now, give me a minute.”

Jack had wanted it on his back, legs spread open for Eric and his entire body on display. Eric had needed to bite the inside of his cheek as he pushed into Jack, taking in the dark flush that spread down Jack’s torso, the way he fisted his own cock and bared his throat as he gasped at the slow slide. The image flashes through Eric’s brain and it’s almost enough to make him disregard their plans for today--they’ll get to Boston when they get there, and Shitty can fucking  _ deal with it _ because Eric would be more than happy to repeat that particular experience right the hell now. 

Jack smirks again at the way Eric has cast his eyes down and started washing his hair too vigorously in an effort to get it together, and says, “Sure, Bits. I'm going to get out and dry off. Want me to start you a breakfast shake?”

“Please,” Eric replies, watching Jack get out of the shower. A second later the shower door opens again and Jack leans in to plant a kiss directly on Eric’s mouth.

“Sorry, had to,” Jack says, then disappears again.

*

Before they leave the apartment, Eric stashes the clothes from his duffel in the drawer Jack cleared for him, and realizes in that moment that Jack felt the need to make him a space  _ before _ asking him to be his boyfriend. Eric laughs to himself and shuts the drawer, fishes his second-favorite cologne out of his bag and places it on top of the dresser beside Jack’s. He taps his fingers on the surface, pleased with how they look side-by-side, then turns as Jack impatiently calls his name from down the hall.

“I’m coming, honey, calm down!”

Jack is already half out the door, both Eric’s suitcases waiting outside.

Eric takes a second in the entryway before they go. The apartment is still a little sparse, but the few things from their shopping trip really have warmed the place up. Empty picture frames lean against walls, waiting to be hung in the places Eric helped Jack mark with pencil.

He feels a little breathless, looking at it. He’s suddenly not so shaken about having to leave. Eric has dreaded this moment all week, but all he can think as he scans his eyes over this place he has inhabited so effortlessly with Jack is,  _ I’ll be right back _ . 

It feels like the throw on the sofa, and the rugs on the floor, and the clothes in his drawer are there to mark his spot. It’s the way he feels when he leaves the quilt his grandmother made him on his bed at his parents’ house at the end of every summer--like home will be here when it’s time to come back. There’s a safe feeling in that, and Eric is surprised to feel it now. Eric absently thinks,  _ That quilt would look great with the curtains in the bedroom here. _

Jack pauses with his hand on the door. “Bits?”

“Sorry, I'm coming.”

Jack reaches out and squeezes his hand. “If you want to go kiss the mixer goodbye I won't be jealous.”

Eric smacks his arm and breezes past him. “Keep it up, Zimmermann.”

They load Jack’s car with Eric’s bags and head to Boston right on time. 

“I think I need a bigger trunk,” Jack says, shoving the second large suitcase into the space left in his old Camry. “This car was my mother’s, and it has a huge stain in the backseat from that time Shitty spilled bong water in it. Might be time for an upgrade.”

Eric side-eyes him as they climb in and get buckled. “You let Shitty smoke in here?”

“ _ Let _ is a relative term,” Jack grumbles. 

Eric plugs his phone into the auxiliary cable and says, “You probably  _ should _ look into getting a car manufactured in the last fifteen years. Forget the bong water, you need bluetooth.”

Jack shrugs. “Maybe, yeah.”

They pull out of the parking lot and Eric starts his playlist.

“Oh hey, Beyonce,” Jack says. He’s smiling, Eric knows, because he’s proud of himself for recognizing a song right off the bat.

“Oh, good boy,” Eric tells him, reaching over to pat his knee. “You’re learning.”

“Please,” Jack says with an eye roll. “You kicked me once over this woman. I did some research.”

Eric can only look at him for that one, as fondness fills him up from his toes to the top of his head. “Just for that, you can pick one of those god awful country singers you like and I will open myself up to the possibility of willingly listening to their music.”

Jack reaches across to the glove compartment and grabs a pair of sunglasses. He says, “Sounds like a plan, Bittle. You like Carrie Underwood, though, don’t lie.”

Eric smiles once the sunglasses perched on Jack’s nose and says, “Those look great on you.”

_ Everything  _ tends to look great on Jack. Eric won’t say that, though, because he really is trying to steer Jack away from the about-to-rob-a-fast-food-joint aesthetic. He will, however, enjoy the fact that his boyfriend--his  _ actual _ boyfriend who is a real human being and is  _ Jack _ \--is gorgeous, and especially in those Ray-Bans.

“Thanks,” Jack says, the demure way he always does when he’s paid any sort of compliment on his appearance. “Ransom picked these out, I think, a long time ago.”

Eric hums. “Ransom has excellent taste, as we all know.”

Jack shoots him a smirk and says, “Yeah but about the  _ shorts _ \--”

“Oh, hell no,” Eric says, throwing one hand up. “I am  _ not  _ Team Birkholtz on this one. The shorts are great on Rans, the end.”

“Disagree,” Jack says flatly, shaking his head. “They’re the color of...like…”

“They’re  _ salmon _ , so they’re the color of  _ salmon, _ ” Eric says, exasperated, which starts a debate on what color “salmon” really is, considering the fish itself is many different colors both inside and out.

Eventually, Eric slams both hands on the dashboard and says, “Jack! The name of the color is not the point, it’s the  _ artistic  _ word for a certain shade of pink. It  _ literally does not matter _ what salmon scales look like at different stages of fish development and  _ no _ , I will  _ not _ look that up on Wikipedia for you, oh my  _ god. _ ”

Jack laughs, and reaches over to ruffle Eric’s hair. “Ok, Bits. If you say so.”

Eric has to take a moment and catch his breath. It’s a chirpy conversation like so many they’ve had, long before Jack ever kissed him, up to and including the casually intimate touch. It sort of hits Eric right then that all those times Jack knocked Eric’s hat down to cover his eyes, or tugged at his hoodie strings, or whatever--whether Eric or Jack knew it at the time or not--that was  _ flirting _ . It thrills him, and he spends several songs quietly re-examining several distinct memories he has.

It’s not a long drive to Boston, and they’ve missed the rush hour, so they make excellent time. Eric spends most of the drive with one hand on Jack's thigh while they debate and chirp back and forth, but as they start to search for parking, he pulls his hand away and clears his throat.

“ _ Entering bro mode, _ ” he says, going for joking and hitting somewhere between that and just a tad bitter. He winces at himself.

“Bits--” Jack starts, making as though he’s going to grab Eric’s hand before he can pull it fully away.

Eric shakes his head, rushing to fix it because he  _ really  _ didn’t intend for it to come out like that. “Lord, Jack, you don't need to comfort me on this one. If there's one thing I'm good at it's pretending I'm not interested in you  _ in that way. _ ”

“Uh,” Jack coughs. “Well.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Eric says, giggling. “You  _ know  _ you didn’t notice for the longest time.”

“Well,  _ I’m _ oblivious and everyone knows that,” Jack says, without even a hint of embarrassment. “But like… Shitty definitely noticed. Pretty sure Rans and Holster did too. They, uh. I think I got yelled at for leading you on, once. I just had no idea what they were talking about.”

Eric stares at his profile, mouth open in shock. “You got  _ yelled _ at?”

“Yeah, Holster said I had to be more sensitive to your feelings. Then Rans showed me a spreadsheet of all the times I was sending mixed signals and potentially  _ confusing _ you. It was...really weird.”

“God bless those boys,” Eric says, heart swelling in his chest. “I’m gonna hug them both later. They won’t know why, but they’re getting hugs.”

“They  _ yelled _ at me, though. There was a presentation,” Jack grumbles. 

“Oh, Jack,” Eric reaches over and pats his knee. “You didn’t mean to, obviously, and I had no clue because it never occurs to me that anyone has signals to send me in the first place. The point is, those boys look out for me. They need hugs and pie.”

Jack makes a sound of assent, distracted as they circle the block again.

“Oh, there’s a spot,” Jack says after a moment, and pulls up to parallel park. “Well I’m sorry, I guess, for being confusing completely by accident.”

“You’re forgiven,” Eric reassures, hiding his grin by turning his face toward the window. Jack scoffs, and Eric doesn’t have to look to know he’s rolling his eyes.

Jack parks the car and pays the meter. Eric glances around, trying to figure out where exactly they are, but he really doesn’t spend much time outside of the Samwell area and can’t recognize anything. 

“Shitty’s meeting us at the pizza place,” Jack says. “It’s a couple blocks that way.”

Eric reaches out and fixes Jack’s bangs where they flop over his forehead, caught behind the frames of his sunglasses. He lets his fingers linger a few seconds longer than strictly necessary, since it’ll probably be the last time he gets to touch Jack until they leave for the Haus. 

“Lead the way,” he says, and Jack smiles at him, then gestures with his shoulder before heading off down the sidewalk. 

“You ready for this?” Jack asks. “Shitty’s gonna flip when he sees us, hope you’re braced for it.”

“I’ve missed his hugs,” Eric says. “The naked ones, not so much, but…”

Jack laughs. “I never thought I’d say this, but it’s sort of weird not having a naked, stoned Shitty staring at me first thing in the morning.”

“Oh, should I be stoned as well as naked, then? So you’re not too disappointed?”

Jack bumps their shoulders together, laughing again. “You know what I mean.”

“I do know,” Eric says on a sigh. “This year’s gonna be so different. Don’t even get me started on next year when  _ I’m _ the most senior person in the Haus. Just thinking about more people leaving makes me want to cry.”

“It’ll be fine, Bits,” Jack says. “You’ll see. This year will be great, you’re a junior now -- time to start making plans, figuring out what you want to do.”

That makes Eric nauseous. He shakes his head. “You trying to send me into full blown stress baking mode? That sounds even more terrifying.”

“You helped me with it,” Jack reminds him. “I’ll help you, too. And Rans and Holster are your captains now. They’ll want to be there for you. Like I said, it’ll be great.”

Just as Eric opens his mouth to respond to that, he hears it. 

“JaaaaAAAAAACCCKKKK!” Shitty’s voice carries from behind them, and before either of them can turn he is bowling into Jack’s back, nearly knocking him over.

Eric jumps out of the way, laughing as Shitty clings to Jack with all four limbs. Jack straightens up with a groan. 

“Jesus, Shits,” he gasps. “You knocked the air out of me.” 

“YOU ADONIS, I MISSED YOU SO MUCH!” Shitty is screaming in Jack’s ear before kissing it. “You are HUGE! What are they FEEDING you?”

Shitty looks over Jack’s shoulder and grins widely at Eric. 

“Hi, Shitty.”

“Eric Richard Bittle,” Shitty says, jumping down from Jack’s back and dramatically shoving Jack away so he can step forward and sweep Eric into a spinning hug. “You look very tan, very toned, with the hair on point and the very spiffy shirt, like you’re here to pick up boys, I fucking love it.”

Eric laughs and winks at Jack over Shitty’s shoulder. “I do try.”

Shitty lets go of him and pulls Jack in so he can sling an arm over each of their shoulders. “You two beauts. How’s everything? Jack? Tell me literally everything about your life starting from the moment you left Samwell up until this very second. Bits? Same deal. Also, I need you to tattle on Zimmermann. His apartment is just a TV for watching tape and a blender for protein shakes, isn’t it? He put that fucking “be better” poster in the living room. You can tell me.”

Under the guise of wrapping an arm around Shitty, Eric reaches over and gives Jack a little pinch.

“Now, now,” Eric says as they make their way down the sidewalk. “Let’s not assume the worst, Shitty.”

Jack shoots him a smile behind Shitty’s back, then starts making up decor that doesn’t exist. 

“You DO NOT have Lardo’s painting of me across from your toilet!” Shitty howls, slapping Jack on the back.

“I do so,” Jack says. “And right above it, my diploma.”

Eric’s face hurts already from smiling so wide, and as Shitty yells at Jack, pulling Eric along with them, he can’t help but feel worlds better about this day and what it will hold. 

*

Over pizza and beers, for which Eric is very glad he wasn’t carded, Shitty tells them about his apartment, the multiple ways his father drove him insane all summer, and his first brushes with the law school crowd.

“I don’t like it,” he says decisively, slamming down his beer. “I’m going to have to cleanse my palate on the regular.”

Eric reaches over and pats his shoulder. “Give me a little notice and I can have a pie ready for you before you even pull up to the Haus.”

“My god, Bits,” Shitty cries, hand to his heart. “I love you, you know. I hope you know that. I do. And I miss your tiny, perky Southern ass so much it physically hurts me.”

Across the table, Jack is verging on a glare. Eric wrinkles his brow at him and nudges him under the table, trying to communicate with a tilt of his head:  _ You look like a serial killer, what’s up? _

Jack shakes the look away and says, “You’re fifteen minutes away from the Haus, Shits. You can get away whenever you need to. And I’m sure Lards would be happy to have you around.”

Shitty sighs expansively, and picks his beer up again. “Lardo. I already miss Lardo and I saw her two days ago.”

Jack shoots Eric a look that Eric can  _ not  _ read, though Jack clearly expects him to. There’s an awkward lull in the conversation, then Jack appears to give up on waiting for  _ Eric _ to say whatever it is needs to be said and speaks himself.

“So,” he starts, clearly trying to be casual. “How was Lardo’s internship?”

Shitty shrugs. “Fine, I guess. She complained about the heels a lot. She had to be fancy. Lotta rich white people bullshit to deal with. I sympathize, you know, as that is from whence I came and removing myself from it continues to be my personal Sisyphean hell.”

Jack looks frustrated. Eric is so going to pick this conversation apart when they’re alone again. For now, he watches the two of them go back and forth. 

“Uh huh,” Jack says. “But so… You and Lardo, like… What’s um. Did you see her much?”

“Ye-es,” Shitty says, giving Jack the hairy eyeball. “What are you getting at?”

Eric bites his lip to keep from smiling.  _ Oh Jack _ , he thinks,  _ subtlety has never been your strong suit.  _

“I think he means, you know,” Eric cuts in, giving Jack a look he  _ hopes  _ says  _ drop it _ , “you let her hang, crash at your place while she was doing her internship at the gallery so… Shitty, just come to the Haus. That’s what we’re saying. Consider us your Harvard hideaway. Ok?”

“You guys,” Shitty shakes his head and downs his beer. “Lights of my life.”

*

“Are Shitty and Lardo together?” Eric whispers to Jack on the way to the car. They’re going to see Shitty’s apartment before heading down to Samwell. Behind them, Shitty is involved in what sounds like an epic argument with his father over the phone.

“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” Jack says out of the side of his mouth. “He said some things at graduation, but I’m not sure if he… followed through, if you know what I mean.”

Eric blinks. “Are you saying he had  _ plans _ ?”

“Well, no,” Jack says. “But she stayed with him for a  _ month _ , I kinda figured…”

Eric glances back at Shitty, where he’s gesticulating at nothing and whisper-screaming into the phone. “I think he’s not in the greatest frame of mind right now.”

Jack sighs. “Yeah. You were right, I really need to have him over.”

Eric gives Jack a little nudge with his elbow. “You will, then. Be a good best bro. Have bro time. Bro it up. Whatever it is you people do.”

“Us people,” Jack snorts. “You live in what is basically a frat house.”

Shitty jogs up and slips between them. “What people? What about my Haus?”

“Just talking about the damage Rans and Holster may have done to the place since they got in yesterday,” Eric tells him. “Poor Chowder won't arrive til close to midnight tonight and I plan to have a pie waiting for him, assuming the kitchen is still standing.”

Shitty sighs heavily. “Fuck. I hate everything. Come on, let’s go to my place so I can smoke a bowl.”

*

They pull up to the Haus at almost 6 that evening. Eric sees that pretty much every window facing the street is blazing with light and can't help but grin.

“Haus, sweet Haus,” he sighs.

Jack is quiet in the driver’s seat. Eric looks over and sees that Jack is staring up at the windows too, his expression hard to read.

“Jack?”

Jack shifts his eyes to Eric’s face and to Eric’s surprise he says, “I feel sad, all of a sudden.”

Eric reaches over and grasps his hand. “What is it?”

Jack is silent for a moment longer, playing with Eric’s fingers. Eric thinks Jack probably doesn't realize he's doing it, but he watches their hands together on the center console and waits.

Jack says, “I feel like I'm home? But I'm not. I don't live here. It's… strange. And sad.”

Eric feels his mouth turn up into a smile, knows it's a little sad, a little fond, and wants badly to lean across the car and press a kiss to Jack’s cheek. Instead he squeezes Jack’s fingers. 

“This is your home, too,” he says. “Whenever you want it to be.”

Eric watches Jack’s face. He hasn't seen Jack look like this in a long time-- like he's having an emotion he hasn't given himself permission to have, like he wants to bury it and move past it. So he squeezes Jack’s fingers a little harder.

“Come on, baby,” he murmurs. “Let’s get in there and see what the boys are up to.”

Jack looks at him then, meets his eyes. Eric feels a sense of satisfaction when Jack’s face clears a little, when he smiles without a struggle. 

Jack surprises him by leaning forward and stealing a quick kiss before getting out of the car. 

“This boy,” Eric grumbles, and follows him.

The Haus door bangs open and Ransom and Holster fall out of it screaming. 

Eric turns and is nearly knocked to the ground with the force of their tandem hug. He hears Jack laughing behind him, telling them to go easy, the season is just a couple months away and they can’t go damaging Bitty, now. Holster yells at Jack that he's not the captain anymore, and Ransom ruffles Eric’s hair with a, “Missed you, Bits!”

Eric eventually shakes them off and they move on to jumping all over and chirping Jack. Eric looks up at the Haus and can't help his grin. Like Jack said, it feels like home.

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on tumblr! adventuresinsuburbia.tumblr.com


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